


lilacs in late summer

by dustbear



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Flower Shop, F/M, M/M, Romantic Comedy, not that much of an AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-26
Updated: 2013-10-15
Packaged: 2017-12-24 17:14:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 31,363
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/942491
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dustbear/pseuds/dustbear
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Maria Hill is getting married. Maria Hill is planning her dream wedding.</p><p>Phil Coulson is Maria Hill's best man. Phil Coulson has never planned his dream wedding, except for that one time when he was six, and a dream wedding that consists entirely of marrying Captain America cannot count. Phil has lived through teenage sexual repression, then Don’t-Ask-Don’t-Tell, and is currently living the life of a balding, gay, middle-aged, overworked S.H.I.E.L.D. agent, so he hasn’t given much thought to planning a dream wedding since he was six.</p><p>Clint Barton, and Natasha Romanov, run a flower shop.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I was feeling down, and I also just wrote a giant downer of a fic, so I'm writing a fluffy-as-fuck romantic comedy. This is going to be fluffy, it's going to be a comedy of errors, it's going to be silly as all hell and I'm going to love writing it.
> 
> This fic will update once or twice a week!

Phil Coulson considered himself an observant man, but six months spent in South America tracking a HYDRA base could easily fry anyone's nerves. Finally back in his small office on the helicarrier, he'd settled in for the night with a reheated cup of coffee and a stack of junior agent field reports. He didn’t particularly enjoy reading junior agent field reports, but he really liked the quiet that descended upon the Helicarrier at about ten every night, right after the standard complement of graveyard personnel rotated in.  It was Saturday night, and Phil Coulson was doing exactly what he had come to believe he liked doing on a Saturday night.

And this Saturday night, Maria Hill is doing exactly what she likes doing, which is poking her head into Phil’s office, at the perfect moment to disrupt whatever it is he is doing, which at this moment, is trying to drink his cup of microwaved coffee.

"You look cheerful," he says, because she does. Maria Hill's chilliness is legendary around the helicarrier, but Phil has known her for long enough to know that the dismissive calm she radiates is in fact - actual calmness. Maria Hill, believe it or not, wears her emotions on her sleeve, it's just that the spectrum of emotions between preternatural disdain and subtle frustration is the exact spectrum that she chooses to reside in most frequently. Today, Maria Hill is apparently digging into an unanticipated well of feeling to project both excitement and glee in Phil's direction.

"Are you going to say something, or are you just going to stand there grinning like a cat who's just eaten several canaries?" Phil asks, because Maria is legitimately starting to unnerve him. She steps in, shutting the door behind her, her face alight in a beatific expression that Phil hasn't seen on many people, much less Maria Hill.

"Phil, will you be my best man?" Maria says.

"What?" Phil says, because - _what_? 

"Or maid of - well, man of honor, whichever you prefer?"

"Was there a sentence that was supposed to precede all these?" Phil asks, rubbing his temples.

"Oh, right. Yes. Phil, I'm getting married!"

Phil Coulson considered himself an observant man, but that was unexpected. The last time he'd seen Maria, she was joking about entering a nunnery, and either the chastier or floozier definitions would have seemed more likely than this. 

He takes a large gulp of his coffee, hoping that the gesture would give him enough time to formulate a response.  Perhaps even one that sounded more like "Congratulations!" or "Yay!" instead of "Who the hell are you marrying?" which had apparently escaped his lips unbidded anyway. But, Maria still had another card up her sleeve.

"Jasper Sitwell."

Phil drops his coffee mug in his lap, and he's never felt so grateful to suffer first degree burns. The scramble for paper towels and new pants and aloe vera means that at least for now, the topic is temporarily shelved.

\---

Later when the shock has worn off a little, and after Jasper Sitwell has stopped by Phil's office wearing the same inscrutable grin and asked Phil to be his best man, Phil sits his two best friends down at a bar known for tolerating the shenanigans of S.H.I.E.L.D. agents, and buys everyone at least three rounds of drinks.

"How long have you even been dating? You certainly weren't when I left. Wait, were you?" Phil asks, but he’s certain they were not, because if he’s been that dense, he’s going to write Nick Fury his resignation letter and turn in his secret agent card right now.

"Er, just three months. We figured we'll tell you when you got back, but...we shifted up the timeline a bit." Maria says.

"It started in Sarajevo." Sitwell says.

"Sarajevo is surprisingly romantic." Maria adds.

The last time Phil'd been in Sarajevo, he'd been a junior agent and the city was under siege. But it has been a couple decades since then, and Maria Hill was the sort of person who might find a souvenir mortar shell with her name engraved on it romantic. Later that night, after a shot of something that Sitwell refused to drink, Maria would point out that she was turning forty, and Jasper was turning forty five, and in their line of work, it seemed unnecessary to dance around each other for a few more years if you already knew what you wanted.

"We can't agree on who gets you, so we've decided that we can share you as best man and maid of honor." Jasper explains patiently, his hand clasped around Maria's, and jeez, that still looks so _weird_. 

"Alright, fine. So, when are we going down to City Hall?" Phil finally gives in. He's happy for them. He is. 

The glances that Maria and Jasper give each other should have clued him in, but if the glee on Maria's face that accompanied the initial wedding announcement was a wonderful incongruity, it was absolutely nothing compared to Maria Hill painstakingly describing her dream wedding.

\---

Phil Coulson has never planned his dream wedding, except for that one time when he was six, and a dream wedding that consists entirely of marrying Captain America cannot count. Phil has lived through teenage sexual repression, then Don’t-Ask-Don’t-Tell, and is currently living the life of a balding, gay, middle-aged, overworked S.H.I.E.L.D. agent, so he hasn’t given much thought to planning a dream wedding since he was six.

It turns out, S.H.I.E.L.D. agents are not trained for weddings.

Thus, Phil Coulson does not know what to do with a spy who has chosen to focus her hyper competence on planning a dream wedding, and has found said competence lacking in this particular field. Phil Coulson absolutely, certainly, does not know what to do with a best friend who can handle airlifting two thousand refugees out of an active war zone without batting an eyelash, but is apparently falling apart at the thought of having to choose between a linen blend and a cotton rag paper for the invitations. Maria Hill can order a kill shot with more certainty than she can pick a date in late summer, and take down a room full of junior agents with more efficiency than she can settle on a catering theme. Phil would find it all a bit laughable if he hadn’t been suddenly appointed Listener-in-Chief.

The plan was simple. Phil would take Maria out to coffee, gently suggest she hire a wedding planner, even offer to pay for one as his wedding gift, and everything would be solved. Maria would stop spending all her spare time quietly freaking out about having to invite both sets of parents(divorced, ugly) and their current partners(jealous, catty). Phil would stop spending all his spare time reassuring Maria that not inviting her grand aunt Lucia(racist, drunky) would not cause a permanent family rift.

The way it works out - of course - is nothing like that at all.

“Jesus Christ, Maria, I’ll do your flowers.” Phil groans, dropping his face to his desk, where Maria has printed out a Wikipedia article called “The Meaning of Flowers,” that is now covered with her handwritten notes and highlighting in neon pink marker.

“What?”

“Maria. If I have to hear you stress out about the appropriate height of centerpieces again, or bitch about the cost of having flowers flown in from Holland - when you keep on saying you want to shop local anyway - I will personally let every junior agent in your training rotation know that they should be throwing you a bridal shower in three months. With penis lollipops.”

“You’ll take care of my flowers?” Maria says, an odd look of relief in her eyes.

“Yes. Write down a list of what you think you want, and I’ll talk to florists and I’ll get back to you with options in your price range next week, okay?”

Maria noticeably sags into her chair. “Thanks, Phil. You’re a good friend.”

\---

Phil Coulson is a good friend. Phil Coulson is the best friend in the world. Phil Coulson is a sap. Phil is single,  obnoxiously single, and his best friends are getting married to each other, and Phil is happy for them, he really is. Phil Coulson is a very, very, good friend.

And, this is why Phil Coulson is standing in the lobby of the nondescript office building that is S.H.I.E.L.D.'s New York field offices, staring at the bike messenger who has just waltzed in the front doors, holding a gorgeous flower delivery. He was on his way out for lunch, he tells himself, and he'd seen the flowers saunter by, and he thought that maybe he could pick up a business card. For Maria. For Maria's wedding. Because weddings have flowers. Maria wants flowers for her wedding. And the flowers here, an exuberant explosion of lilies and roses and some sort of green leafy vine Phil can’t identify, are beautiful. This is all about Maria, he thinks, admiring the way the messenger's bike shorts hug his gorgeous thighs.

"Like what you see?" The messenger speaks, and his voice is deep, and throaty, and flirty, and Phil yelps, because today, Phil is apparently set on being a very, very good friend, but a shit secret agent.

The _flowers_ , Phil. He's asking if you like the flowers, Phil's inner voice assures him. "Yes! I mean, yes. They're gorgeous." The flowers, Phil, not the man’s extremely well formed calves. Phil, please stop staring at his crotch. He looks up, and realizes that he hasn’t even gotten around to focusing on the upper half of the man yet, which to be fair, is currently blocked by a three foot tall flower arrangement.

"Do you need to order some? Need to apologize to the wife? We're right down the street." the messenger says, a pair of twinkling green eyes poking up from a smattering of sweet-pea.

"Um. No, I'm not married." Phil manages to respond, as the man drops the flowers off at the front desk.

"I could have guessed that" the messenger says, and Phil genuinely hopes that the guess is not because a plain middle aged man standing in his office's lobby eating up a sexy bike messenger with his eyes is probably not a man that has a wife. Sensing his quizzical expression, the messenger clarifies, "I mean, you're not wearing a ring." Oh, or _that_. That is a much better, and certainly a much less humiliating, guess.

Come on, Phil, you've faced down Mafia bosses and madmen, you can handle a good looking guy in purple spandex bike shorts, his inner voice prods. His inner voice is being exceptionally encouraging today, which is fortunate.

"Actually, I have a friend getting married soon. I thought I could pick up a business card to give her?" Phil says.

"Oh yeah, sure!" The messenger says brightly, waving Phil over to his bike outside, where he - oh _please,_ please, do not bend over, Phil thinks, _ah shit_ \- bends over to root around his saddlebags. It feels like it takes minutes for him to dig out a card, and Phil stands agape at the perfect ass encased in shiny purple fabric. Jesus, those shorts are so tight, they're practically pornographic. And they don't even have pockets, an oddly rational part of Phil's brain chimes in.

Phil shifts uncomfortably as the messenger straightens himself.

"Sorry, I was trying to find one of mine. So, you can say I referred you when you come by." the messenger says, handing a small business card to Phil.

"Um, yeah, I will. Say you referred me. When I come by." Phil repeats, realizing that the stranger had drawn out a flower shop visit from him in just one sentence.

"Great! I'll probably see you soon then! I deliver around noon, but I'm usually working in the store. I'm Clint, by the way." he says, reaching out for Phil’s hand.

"Phil." Phil says, returning the firm handshake

Well, not a stranger. His name is Clint, Phil considers, as the messenger hops back on his bike, another lovely pot of flowers precariously balanced on the back. Something in the back of his mind is saying something about the man’s handshake, but he’d been devoting most of his brain power to not tripping on his own tongue, and can’t dwell on it.

Clint gives Phil a sloppy salute as he rides off, and Phil finds himself waving back, with a sloppy smile to match.

He glances down at the card in his hand. Clint Barton, Head Florist, it says. "Arachnoflora. Who the hell names a flower shop Arachnoflora?"


	2. Chapter 2

“You’re late.” Natasha says from the cash register, as Clint pulls his bike into the alley behind Arachnoflora. He had been fairly quiet, but Natasha hears everything.”We have a job tonight.”

“Er, there wasn’t anything on the schedule. We don’t have anything in the evenings besides that Brooklyn loft wedding on Saturday.” Clint says, wheeling his bike into the small back room, and hoisting it up to hang on the wall rack. He wipes the grease off his hands, and saunters into the store, grabbing a red apron emblazoned with the store’s name on it as he slips behind the counter.

“Not a flower job.” Natasha says softly, her hand rubbing circles on his lower back. “I’m sorry. I know it’s been a while.”

“It’s okay, Tasha. We’ve got to pay the rent somehow.” Clint says, because it’s true. The demand for their flowers had nose dived at the same pace as the downturn in the economy, and coupled with the rent increases of the past year, it was inevitable that they would have to supplement the store’s income with their old trade.

They’d had a good run, the first few years here. First, it had just been a storefront, to help them move the cash they acquired through their other profession(Clint had suggested a laundromat, or a car wash, but Natasha said that was far too stereotypical). They had to keep the windows stocked with flowers, and Clint had found arranging the flowers peaceful. He'd sit in the window for hours, slowly assembling a bucket of roses into something that was grander than its parts, and it centered him. Natasha had gotten a contact then, one that knew where to find and deliver the most beautiful fresh plants that Clint had ever seen, and he gladly fell into the world of floral wire and unconventional plant receptacles. He learned to distinguish ranunculus from cabbage roses from peonies, learned to dye white daisies blue, learned where to find the best orchids in the Flower District. Curious customers had started walking in, and then they became repeat customers, and then they became a loyal fanbase. Clint had a way with flowers, it turned out, creating large, exuberant, slightly messy floral arrangements that became in demand with a certain artsy crowd partial to mid century modern furniture, Kafka, and Sunday brunch.

Within six months of their opening, Natasha and Clint had found themselves with more florist work than they’d ever thought likely, and even Natasha had to admit that it was a relaxing, and strangely fulfilling, break from their usual work.

The day he’d started to experiment with the flowers, staining the tips of carnations with beet juice, Natasha had walked in, looked at his blood red hands, and started laughing hysterically. He’d drawn a streak of red down her face with his hands, watching her squeal in mock-terror and real-indignation, and they’d both gone down hard on the shiny concrete floor of the store, wrestling each other to a draw. They looked at each other then, sprawled on the floor, panting and covered in streaks of red-purple-magenta juice, and they didn’t have to speak to know what the other was thinking. They didn’t have to speak of the years they’d spent together, the years they had spent fucking in adrenaline fueled rage and relief, often in red, wet streaks of blood, mostly their own. But passion cools into platonic friendship, and blood becomes beet juice, and unsanitary sex become twin beds in a one bedroom loft in Bed-Stuy. And Hawkeye and Black Widow become just Clint Barton and Natasha Romanov, and they buy a delivery van the first year so they can deliver flowers to weddings in New Jersey.

\---

Clint sits in a small, overpriced hotel room in Manhattan, peering out the window at the apartments across the street. He spots the target quickly, who is impatiently dunking a teabag into a microwaved mug of water. He matches the photograph they’ve been given, which is one of ordinary everyman-ness, but many of them are. Horrible people don’t tend to look particularly horrible - they look boring and dull; evil doesn't picks its vessels for aesthetics, and the worst ones never look particularly villainous. There is an itch crawling down Clint’s spine. He doesn’t like sniper rifles, never has, probably never will. And he doesn't like this job either.

"I've spotted the sad, rumpled, middle aged accountant. He’s making chamomile tea, for goodness sake. Are we gonna go shoot some kittens after this?" He hands the rifle off to Natasha to confirm the mark and squints at the target.

“That’s him.” Natasha says, handing back the rifle to Clint. "Take the shot."

Clint looks through his scope, looks at the balding man sitting on the couch. He’s frowning at something on his coffee table now, his forehead furrowed in thought, and Clint tilts his sights down a little to see - huh, that was unexpected. His target has spread out several back issues of what looks like Martha Stewart’s Weddings, and is gnawing impatiently on the end of a black Sharpie as he flips through the pages, pausing to scrawl notes on Post-Its that he applies vigorously to the pages. He’s wearing blue flannel pajamas, with tiny red and white stars on them, and fuzzy socks.

“Who is he?” Clint asks.

“I don’t know.”

“You’re lying and I’m not taking the shot unless you tell me.” Clint lowers his scope to frown at Natasha. They had made an agreement, years ago, to only prey on the wicked. The wicked aren’t always easy to recognize, it turns out. They have birthday parties, they own goofy labrador retrievers, they like slurping spaghetti and meatballs, they even manage to raise perfectly ordinary children. So, he had learned to develop a finely honed instinct for evil - the sort of abstracted gloom that hangs over the heads of the proud and psychopathic, and proudly psychopathic. This man, sitting in his small living room alone, incongruously picking out floral centerpieces in wedding magazines, is simply not evil. He just _knows_.

“I was told that he is a small time drug dealer. He’s trying to bust up a rival drug ring, marijuana and ecstasy mainly. "

"Since when do we execute small time dealers that sell hippie party drugs?"

"They just want him off their back, so just shoot him in the shoulder as a warning, or something.“ Natasha says, but Clint hears the tension in her voice and knows that she is just parroting words from a kill order.

“You do realize that my entire reputation hinges on not shooting people in the shoulder when I’m supposed to shoot them in the head, right?”

“Clint - “

“He’s not a bad guy. I’m not taking the shot.” Clint decides.

“And how would you know that?”

“I just _know_ , Tash. His modest apartment. The nerdy vintage Captain America poster on the wall. His bookshelf is full of speculative science fiction and textbooks on military strategy and all the spines are well cracked. He has a row of nice black suits in his closet, but he’s padding around in ratty flannel pajamas and a pair of old socks. He doesn’t keep a weapon by the door, unless that umbrella is supposed to be threatening. He has an Army Ranger tattoo on his left arm, and he hasn’t done his dishes in at least four days. He’s certainly ex-military, he might be current law enforcement, which is another reason for me not to take the shot, because you know how that shit will get out of hand. But mostly, it’s my gut feeling, and I haven't lived this long by ignoring my gut feelings. No one pays fifty thousand dollars to take out small time pot dealers anyway. He’s not whatever the kill sheet says he is, Tasha. Besides, what happened to only taking out bad people?”

“Clint, we really need the money. This will pay our rent for six months.”

In response, Clint unloads the rifle, disassembles it, and throws the pieces in front of Natasha. He tosses the clip back into the backpack that contains all their ammunition and stands up, swinging it over his shoulder. He knows he's being petulant, but _fuck_ , they weren't supposed to be doing this anymore.

“Are you really going to leave me to finish this?” Natasha growls, reaching for the rifle parts on the floor. She reassembles the rifle without bothering to look down at it, her practiced hands knowing the parts by feel, and swings it back to the window. “Give me the ammo.”

“Tasha, we don’t _need_ the money, not for this. How much more blood can we add to our hands, how much more red on our ledger? How many more pieces of our soul do you want to sell to mad men?” Clint says. It comes out more a deliberate whine than an earnest plea, and Natasha is not the sort to give in to either, but he can try. They stare at each other for what feels like hours, and then Natasha’s face crumples and softens.

"Give me the phone." Natasha says, and Clint rummages in the backpack for the burner phone, tosses it to her. She dials a memorized number in, and they wait as it rings.

"We do not have the shot. I repeat, we do not have the shot." She waits for the response, and Clint watches her pale slightly, one of her subtle tells that only he knows. "Shit." Natasha says. "They have another team. If you want to save this weird nerd, give me the ammo."

"I wish I had my bow.” Clint groans, digging the clip back out of the pack.

“Yeah, you can also start leaving calling cards around that say ‘LOVE, HAWKEYE’ on them, if you like. And after I went to all that effort to fake our deaths.”

Natasha loads the clip, swings around, and fires a barely aimed shot through the man’s window, watching as the living room fills with glass. “What? How else was I supposed to warn him?” 

She tosses the sniper rifle back to Clint. The man is ducked behind the couch now, out of sight, and Clint sees the front door shatter open even as the other building occupants stream out of the building, prompted by both the bullets and the explosion. He lines up his shots, trying to follow the four men who burst into the apartment - they’re all large brutes, more form than finesse. Clint sighs. He’s glad he’s not taking this contract against the man in flannel. It’s all so _inelegant_.

He inhales, prepares to take out the “enemy”, and it’s so strange that he’s taken sides so quickly, but in the moment it takes him to think that, the man in the flannel pajamas pops up from behind the couch, and as if in slow motion, Clint sees the man knock back a large swig of tea, and promptly lob the mug hard in the direction of the intruders. It hits right between the eyes of the largest brute, who goes down like a sack of wet concrete. The rest happens in a blur, because another one of the invaders goes down just as fast, whining and scrabbling at a felt tip Sharpie embedded in his eye.

The man is honest-to-god fighting now, a peculiar grace and steadiness in his movements that Clint would never have expected. Sure, the Army Ranger tattoo was a give away, but the man is attacking an armed man nearly twice his size with nothing but a folded up copy of Martha Stewart’s Weddings - and Clint knows that issue, there’s a lovely tulip and calla lily concept in it - and he’s winning. Easily. The fourth brute is charging behind the man in flannel, raising his weapon to shoot, and Clint has already picked his side, and besides, it's easy to cheer the victorious. He takes the shot, and the brute's forehead disappears in a spray of blood, at the same time that the large man being pummelled by a Millwall bricked wedding magazine takes a crippling blow to his thick skull.

The man in the flannel pajamas spins around then, pausing only to frown at the perfect headshot in the apparently less than competent assassin at his feet, blinks twice, and then looks directly at the window Natasha and Clint are looking out from. Clint knows that the man can’t see him, not with the way the blinds are pulled in the dark room, but he remains motionless anyway. The man in flannel stands there, furrowing his brow, and Clint notices his blue eyes through the scope, notices how they crinkle at the edges with amusement, and notices that the man is smiling. The man salutes, a thank you, and Clint is stricken with the thought that he’s met this man before, but can’t quite place his wry face. He is also stricken by the sudden ba-dumph-badumph-badumph-BUMP in his chest because, holy crap, _that was really hot_.

“Clint. We have to get out of here.” Natasha says, already jamming her pair of binoculars back into the pack as the flashing lights of police cruisers and fire engines start to come into view from blocks away.

“Tasha, did you see that?” Clint splutters, still staring, because the man in flannel is now sitting on his couch as if there weren’t four assassins lying in his living room(three unconscious, one quite dead), calmly picking broken glass out of his socks, his head cocked to hold the cellphone he’s talking into against his shoulder.

“Yeah, I saw that. That man is dangerous, Barton. This is bigger than us. We should never have gotten involved.“ she says, sticking her head out into the corridor which is fortunately quiet. “Front exit or back exit?” she asks, as Clint disassembles the rifle and sirens blare outside. Clint looks out the windows, notices the unmarked black SUVs already surrounding the building, as well as the above average police response time for the neighbourhood. Something big, indeed.

“Neither. The roof.” he says, and they run. They're good at running, Natasha and Clint, and as they sail over the rooftops of New York, the adrenaline makes Clint feel his heartbeat in his palms, and he feels alive.

“Ugh,” Natasha says, landing gracefully on the edge of a building after an impossible running leap(Clint had just taken a slightly longer, and significantly easier, path over).

“What? Are you okay?” Clint asks, because Natasha is not prone to complaining during quick getaways, even over the wet and grimy rooftops they've been saddled with tonight.

“No, I meant ugh, it’s one in the morning and I forgot to put in the delivery order with Mr. Blackrose before midnight. I’ll have to stop by the flower district tomorrow morning before we open - we have that ridiculously huge hyacinth order.” she says, coming to a quick stop on a small ledge, directly opposite the fire escape for their charmingly worn loft, with all of its charming brick and worn plumbing. She shrugs, prepping herself for the last jump of the night. “I was hoping to sleep in, that's all.”

Clint laughs, the adrenaline finally leaving his body as he watches Natasha catch the rail of the fire escape, swinging herself up and over the rail and into their open window.  Tonight, they had to be Hawkeye and Black Widow, but at least tomorrow, they’ll be just a pair of florists again. A pair of florists, co-proprietors of Arachnoflora, scrambling frantically to fulfil a humungous order of hyacinth centerpieces for yet another _nouveau riche_ client that doesn’t understand that hyacinths aren’t at peak bloom locally in late May.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter footnotes:
> 
> 1\. Oh my god, I love footnotes. Please don't hate me because I love footnoting everything. 
> 
> 2\. In case you ever find a need to improvise a weapon from a copy of Martha Stewart's Weddings, [here is the Wikipedia reference](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millwall_brick) for what a "Millwall brick" is.


	3. Chapter 3

“Well.” Nick Fury says, stepping into Phil Coulson’s new and barren apartment.

“Well?” Phil says, setting down another moving box labelled “Dishes.” It’s a bit of a lie; Phil actually only owns three plates, but the box also holds his fourteen coffee mugs, and a hand-me-down casserole dish that he’s never used, so it’s not entirely inaccurate, just kind of sad. This apartment had some new conveniences, like reinforced doors, bullet proof windows, being walking distance from S.H.I.E.L.D. field offices, and a working ice machine in the refrigerator. It was also technically a S.H.I.E.L.D. owned facility, and it was certainly a safe house more that it was a home. He’d liked his old apartment, if for no greater reason than it was _his_ apartment.

“I think you’ve been made.” Fury says, waving two junior recruits in who have just spent fifteen minutes arguing about how to move Phil’s couch into the apartment. They try to enter, but only manage to actually wedge the couch into the door.

“Oh yeah? Was it the four assassinny assassins trying to assassinate me in my apartment last night that tipped you off?” Phil asks, with an innocently frustrated look.

“Cheese, I’m sor - “

“No apologies needed, and stop calling me that.” Phil grumbles, poking dejectedly at a box containing what might be the remains of his coffee table books. He didn’t know how little he actually owned until he had to move out of his apartment overnight. “We’re all working overtime here and things slip through the cracks. Sometimes, it’s you know, my life - but hey, whatever. So, HYDRA?”

“That’s what we’re leaning towards.” Fury says, leaning against Phil’s new and barren kitchen counter, which is remarkably similar to his old and barren kitchen counter. ”Looks like they have at least a couple people operating out of New York and your South American sleuthing must have lit a fire under their asses. The assassins were hired men, not top tier, sort of middle grade, nothing you couldn't handle. And you’ve got someone looking out for you, it seems.”

“Yeah. I thought the first bullet was just a miss, but now I'm pretty sure it was a warning shot. And the other one, there's no way that was anything but the headshot it was meant to be. It was technically perfect. Any leads there?”

“Not one. We have a couple analysts checking out the hotel room you told us the sniper was in, but no prints yet. You doing okay?”

“Aside from being accosted in my own home, kept awake giving statements to the NYPD for two hours, and then by S.H.I.E.L.D. for another four, and then having to move accompanied by two junior agents who wouldn’t survive as undercover movers if they ever came within two feet of a hand truck - yeah, I’m doing great.” It is entirely possible that Phil is not currently in a great mood.

“Phil, I’m here if you need to talk, and you know I don’t offer that lightly. I know this is stressful for you.” Nick Fury says, his hand on his old friend’s shoulder.

“I promised Maria I’d talk to her about flowers and dresses this week.”

“Oh, jesus, yeah. Good luck with that.“ Nick Fury says, spinning on his heel and promptly walking out, squeezing himself under the couch in the most dignified manner he can muster.

\---

Clint spots the man-in-flannel, although now he’s wearing a rather striking suit, when he’s a block away, crossing the street with an Arachnoflora business card in his hands. Clint would hyperventilate a little, but that instinct of his - the one that screams RUN, whenever it is time to run - isn’t flaring up right now, so he steadies his hands behind the counter and breathes.

“Nat, don’t look up. The man from three days ago, our target. He’s coming in.”

“Is he armed?” Natasha asks, immediately pausing the arrangement she is working on, something with moss and tulips and a stuffed bear that has a "Happy Birthday" shirt on.

“I don’t think so. What are you doing?” Clint says, as Natasha slides a handgun  - _where did that even come from?_ \- onto the ledge below the countertop in front of him.

“I am arming you. And I am walking out the back door to retrieve our stuff from the loft. If you are alive in fifteen minutes, which I assume you will be because you don't suck, I will pick you up out front.” Natasha replies, casually shrugging off her apron and hoisting Clint’s bicycle down from the rack in the back room.

And then, she’s gone.

“Hey. Clint, right?” the man says, standing in the doorway, and he looks small and...normal. There is a veneer of the flannel-clad badass that Clint had observed last night lurking somewhere deep under the surface, but the man standing in front of him is something else altogether. Balding, unassuming, a bit awkward. Clint would think he was mistaken about the man’s identity except Clint sees everything, and the man’s fingers are still stained with Sharpie-black ink and Clint can still recall the frantic flailing of an assassin who has just gotten a felt tip permanent marker jammed in his eye.

“It’s Phil. Um, we met earlier in the week. You were delivering flowers and I asked for a card? For my friend’s wedding.”

Oh shit. _That man?_ That man from the lobby in the nice suit who had stared at his ass. He’d been so...normal, bland, ordinary, if cute in a befuddled middle aged gnome kind of way. But - he was also that _really hot badass_ \- Clint’s brain races to cope with the incongruity, and he’s not doing a particularly good job with it. Fortunately he’s been a florist long enough to instinctively step around the counter and blurt out “Hi! Welcome to Arachnoflora.”

The man, okay, his name is Phil now, smiles, and ducks his head shyly, and Clint stares, because this odd duck of a man couldn’t possibly also be - and then Phil looks down at the memo pad he’s holding, clears his throat, straightens up and _changes_. Clint can practically see the tight muscles ripple under the smartly tailored suit as the other man corrects his posture. The bland smile transforms into a wry, self deprecating grin, the corners of his eyes crinkle in amusement, and when he raises his chin and squares his shoulders - fuck, he’s _really, really hot_.

“Alright.” Phil says, his voice now certain and confident, and Clint feels like he’s about to melt through the floor.

Apparently not noticing, Phil plods on. “I’m pretty sure she likes lilacs.”

\---

Phil is a good friend, which is why he’s working on Maria’s flower situation to clear his mind. It’s definitely because of Maria that he’s walking towards a florist shop located ten long New York blocks(down the street, my ass) from the field offices, after taking a somewhat circuitous route to make sure that he’d lost any possible tail.

He pauses by the doorway of Arachnoflora, partially to thank the gods that the messenger - Clint, that was his name - is standing behind a counter. Because, he most assuredly does not want to find out if the man was somehow dressed in spandex bike shorts again. If he is, Phil thinks, I’m going to walk right out and find a new florist, because I cannot have a dignified conversation with that man if he’s wearing bike shorts.

Fortunately, Clint steps around the counter, and god bless America, he is wearing loose black cargo pants. “Hi! Welcome to Arachnoflora.” he says, and okay, okay, Phil can do this. He’s here for Maria, and he can do this. He clears his throat, and straightens up. He can do this, for Maria. He’ll approach it like a mission. He’s good at missions. “Alright. I’m pretty sure she likes lilacs.“

The smile that Clint shoots him is electric, and Phil tries to look away, because he could certainly deal with the lower half of the man being an impossible distraction if the upper half could conduct professional flower shop business as usual - but if this Clint person is going to be all floppy haired and twinkling green eyes and delicious scruff - “So, what’s the budget?” Clint says, and Phil hopes that he hasn’t been obviously gaping while Clint had been explaining what the store did, because he didn’t hear it. Hopefully, it was no more complex than “We sell flowers.”

“Around $1500. We’re hoping for a bouquet, a couple of boutonnieres and corsages and centerpieces for maybe eight tables.” Phil says. He’d looked up the proper pronunciation of "boutonniere" yesterday. _Nailed it_.

If he’d been stricken by Clint’s more um, physical, attributes at first, it doesn’t compares to the friendly professionalism Clint is currently exuding as he talks about the flowers likely to be in full bloom in late summer. Clint walks Phil around the store, gesturing at several displays in the refrigerators, and looks comfortable and in his element, surrounded by bromeliads and hyacinths and daisies and roses. Phil envies him a little(kind of a lot), admires the easy, kinetic, way he seems to move in his own skin. And the piercing attention that those green eyes manage to focus on him, when Phil’s just talking about colour themes and Maria’s personal flower preferences(he didn’t even know she had any until yesterday; apparently she has many opinions on flowers). They're strangely soothing, like being watched by a very capable and protective lion who also happens to know what a hibiscus is.

“So, I’m thinking, why don’t you come back next week? I’ll whip up some sample arrangements, and you can tell me if any of them look good?” Clint says. "That is, if you're not tired of me yet."

"Nope, definitely not tired of you yet." Phil says.

Thank you, Maria, Phil thinks. _Ave Maria_ , blessed art thou amongst women.

\---

Natasha’s motorcycle screeches to a stop outside the shop, and Clint peers around Phil to see her revving her engine outside with the body language of an annoyed cat. He knows that the jacket she’s wearing is Kevlar lined, and she’s wearing the heavy boots that he’s personally seen her crush skulls in, and not figuratively speaking. He sees his bow case and quiver strapped onto the back of her bike, and knows that her saddlebags are filled with her own weaponry, and probably a change of clothes for them to take on the run.

He rolls his eyes at her, waves her inside despite her furiously quizzical expression. She gestures back at him. The first gesture is rude, and the second tells him that she’s going to park the bike out back.

When she saunters in from the back room, she looks nothing like the Black Widow. The leather jacket tossed over her arm looks like a brisk late spring fashion statement and nothing at all like Kevlar lined body armour. But, Clint knows what Natasha’s brightly fake smiles look like.

“Tasha, this is Phil. He is looking for flowers for his best friend’s wedding. Phil, this is Natasha, my partner.”

Phil’s face twitches a little, and Clint doesn’t really needs to blurt out “My _business_ partner,” but he does.

“Pleased to meet you, Phil. It looks like Clint has you in very good hands.” Natasha says smoothly, but Clint can feel the layer of suspicion radiating off her skin. Natasha retreats to the stock room then, and Clint finishes his conversation with Phil, drawing an appointment out from him for the next week. He watches Phil walk away, and perhaps he does look a bit too predatory, slowly roaming his eyes over the tight lines of the well tailored, lightly pinstriped, suit, because Natasha promptly smacks him upside the head with a rolled up newspaper.  

“No. Absolutely not.” Natasha says. “I don’t know what he’s doing here, but he’s dangerous.”

“He doesn’t know who we are. He’s just trying to coordinate flowers for his best friend’s wedding.” Clint sighs.

“Well, that’s a coincidence.”

“So, maybe he’s CIA or FBI or something. Who cares? I can still sell him flowers, right?” Clint says, which doesn’t help to wipe the frown off Natasha’s face.“Tasha, haven’t you ever felt like you could just _trust_ someone?” Clint asks, because he is hopeful. It’s always been a bad habit of his, having faith in people, but he’s always been the optimistic sort, even when he tries to bury it under layers of snark and cynicism.

“I have. One person.” she says, looking at Clint with an unbearably open look in her eyes, and Clint feels impossibly guilty. They’ve only ever really had each other, after all.

"Tash, I - “ Clint starts, but Natasha has stepped up and thrown her arms around him, pressing her face to his chest like a possessive koala.

“I still trust him. Sometimes more than I trust myself.” she says, pulling away gently. “It’s just that I’m also going to brutally destroy anyone that dares to toy with him.”

 


	4. Chapter 4

"Did you know that you can't wear white unless you're a virgin?" Maria Hill says, standing in front of a gigantic mirror in a ridiculously fancy bridal boutique, the appointment-only kind that serve you tea and tiny biscuits and lavender water, and make up for it with a 75% upcharge. She spins around, watching the five yards of dress around her ankles lift up into a dervish-like tent.

"Is that a problem for you?" Phil asks. He might be a little bit testy, only one hour into the Great Maria Hill Dress Hunt.

"Fuck you." Maria says. “I went to Catholic school, so no, I’m not a virgin, you asshole.”

“You’re Catholic?” Phil asks, because he's known Maria for many years, and he's never known her to be any sort of religious, not even the sort of religious that soldiers become in trenches. 

“My parents are. Come on, there are only two types of people who would name their kid Maria, and my parents have never seen West Side Story.”

They were an ill-matched couple for dress hunting, Maria Hill and Phil Coulson, if only for the fact that neither of them wore dresses or knew anything about them at all. Well, that wasn’t entirely true, but everyone only spoke about that one undercover mission in New Orleans in hushed tones. The rumour was that photographic evidence from that mission is kept under lock and key in Nick Fury’s secure office - well, actually, just Maria Hill’s photographic evidence - Phil Coulson’s pictures made it up on the bulletin board in the breakroom. He didn't mind. His legs looked _amazing_.

“I’m not going to know what sort of dress fits your body type just because I’m gay, Maria,” Phil had said, looking at the binder of bridal dress magazine cutouts Maria had handed him.

“Well, I don’t know what sort of dress fits my body type just because I’m a woman, so I’m going to find a nice sales girl whose job it is to figure it out. You can just tell me if I look stupid, which I know you can do.”

“Yes, I can tell you if you look stupid.” Phil conceded.

So, this is why Phil Coulson is sitting in a fancy bridal store, surrounded by countless yards of chiffon and tulle and silk shantung, which all mostly look stupid on Maria Hill. It was a bit of a surprise, finding out that Maria Hill, active S.H.I.E.L.D field agent and destroyer of worlds(alright, just junior agents that weren't up to snuff at any rate), had apparently been nursing a childhood dream of being a fluffy, fluffy fairy princess.

"Thanks for coming with me, Phil. I know Fury has you on restricted movement." Maria says, as a cheery salesgirl clips her into another enormous dress with a gigantic hoop skirt and at least fourteen rows of ruffles.

"It's just his idea of fretting about me like an overbearing grandmother. Besides, I'm not going to lock myself up in my shitty, temporary apartment just because a couple of HYDRA goons are gunning for me." Phil says.

"I know. I meant you could have used it as an excuse to not be dragged out dress shopping." Maria  frowns at her own extraordinarily poofy silhouette in the mirror.

"Maria, I wouldn't miss it for the world. Besides, I'm pretty sure this is good for my career, especially once you make assistant director. Turn around for a second, will ya’?"

"For _your_ career? How so?" Maria says, whirling around to face him, her ruffles trailing a couple seconds behind her.

Phil grins, and whips his phone out for a picture. "Blackmail. You look like a deranged cupcake."

"Motherfucker.” Maria says, trying out a small jump-hop and watching the poofy dress bounce in step with her movements. “No, really, how do I look?"

Phil grimaces. He's had diplomatic training, this should be a breeze. "I really think you should try on a simple sheath dress next."

\---

“How do you feel about mason jars?” Clint asks. “They’re really trendy right now, and I think my flowers look amazing in them. And, you said your friend wanted a rustic country look. The costs are pretty much negligible, we don’t charge extra for things we find in our neighbour’s recycling.”

“Mm hmm.” Phil says, his fingers tapping on the small reclaimed wood patio table in the coffee shop they’re sitting in. It’s their second meeting; during the first, Phil had decided that he definitely, incontrovertibly, absolutely had a crush on the male co-proprietor of Arachnoflora. Not only was Clint very good looking(oh boy, was that an understatememt), but he was also excellent at his job, and walking away from the first floral consultation with colour swatches and photo samples of Arachnoflora’s work, and Clint’s bright smile still echoing in his head - Phil was a _goner_.

What Phil really wants to say is “How do you feel about blowjobs? They’ve been trendy for at least a few decades and I think your cock would look amazing in my mouth”, but Phil is a distinguished gentlemanly type, at least in public, so he says - “Mason jars sound good. Maria will be meeting us in a minute - she’s running a bit late.”

It was a stupid crush, Phil knew, probably exactly the same sort of stupid crush likely to accompany the mid-life crisis Phil could feel starting to land on Planet Coulson. Perhaps he could go out and buy a red sports car this weekend to match the colour of his balding forehead whenever Clint was around. For now, Clint doesn’t have anything more to say about mason jars, and Phil doesn’t have anything to say that isn’t impossibly lewd, so he sits there grinning like an idiot, staring at Clint’s stupidly gorgeous face, and what he also assumes is Clint’s slightly puzzled expression. Fortunately, Maria is striding briskly down the street, and Phil is silently grateful for his deliverance.

“Hi, I’m Clint, from Arachnoflora.” Clint says cheerily, hand outstretched to meet Maria’s.

“Huh. I mean, hi. Pleased to meet you, Clint.” Maria replies, a bit awkwardly, but she shakes his hand firmly.

Clint chatters brightly on, showing Maria his lovingly rendered thoughts on her flower choices and arrangement options. Maria likes the mason jar idea, and has many other opinions about flowers, so Phil sits back and lets himself watch Clint talk.

“You’ve been in business for how long?” Maria asks. Her smile looks a bit forced, and Phil has never known Maria to force a smile if she didn’t want to smile.

“Four years.” Clint says, sliding over an Arachnoflora brochure.

“Arachnoflora. Is that a spider pun?” Maria asks, her fingers drawing a small circle around the red black widow’s mark that comprises part of the flower shop's logo.

“Yeah, er, my partner named it.” Clint flips the brochure over, points to the picture of him and Natasha on the back. They look cheerful and normal, like the kind of people that the WASPs of upstate New York gladly let into their galas and weddings, even through the front entrance.

“I love the flower ideas. You guys are amazing.” Maria says, and Phil is still having some trouble deciphering her smile, but the words leaving her mouth seem enthusiastic enough. She pockets the brochure when they leave.

When they walk back to the office together, Maria is vibrating with excitement, which Phil thinks is a bit of an overreaction to pretty flowers. But she doesn’t feel inclined to talk to him yet, so he walks with her until they stop in front of his office, and she hauls him in and slams the door behind them.

“I knew it!” Maria blurts out, her face alight in an expression somewhere between certainty and bemusement.

“Know what?”

“Phil, you’re brilliant. Oh my god, they’re fucking legendary! And you’re going to be the ones to bring them in. Holy shit, I cannot believe that you’re going to recruit Hawkeye and the Black Widow. I can’t believe they’ve been under our noses this whole time! Oh man, do you even know what S.H.I.E.L.D. would give to have them on our roster?” Maria spills the words out in a delighted torrent, and Phil has no idea what in the world she’s rambling on about.

“I don’t know - “ Phil stutters. Hawkeye? The Black Widow? The names are familiar enough, and he vaguely remembers something about a S.H.I.E.L.D recruitment attempt on the pair about five years ago. Maria had been on that case.

“Don’t worry, Phil - they’ll be your recruits. I’m not going to tell anyone. Not even Fury, and you shouldn’t either, because he’ll probably have your ass for conducting an unauthorized recruitment. Are they even still in the industry? I can’t believe they’re working as florists! And oh my god, they’re actually really good florists. Hell, I thought they were dead! I closed my case files on them five years ago.”

“Maria -“

“Phil, if you convince them to work for S.H.I.E.L.D...if you actually pull this off, the assistant director position will be yours. I mean, I want it to be _mine_ , but if you do this, you'll deserve it and I'll be happy for you. Just do me one favour, okay?”

“What?”

“Recruit them _after_ I get my flowers. Please.”

Phil stands stunned as Maria Hill practically skips out of his office. Shitbags. Well, he thinks, rubbing his temples in an attempt to stave off the rapidly approaching headache, it’s time to call in a favour.

“Records. Agent Miller speaking.” The voice on the other side of the line is perfectly brusque and abrupt.

“Josh, hi. This is Phil Coulson. Can you pull me the files on Hawkeye and the Black Widow?” Phil says. He’s going to start friendly, but he will escalate this without hesitance.

“Absolutely, I’ll get started once you submit Forms 452-a, 20-a and 656-d, in triplicate please.”

Oh, Phil thinks. Form 452-a, Form 20-a, blah, blah, blah. Is that how it’s going to be, Joshua?

“Agent Miller, remember that time you lost your passport in Brazil?” Phil says. He chooses to be polite. He will not mention the cocaine, or the gerbil. Just the passport. He’s being very nice - for now.  

“I’ll get started right now, Agent Coulson. The electronic files will be on the way immediately, and the paper copies will be expedited.” Agent Miller pauses his frantic typing for a second. ”Please submit the relevant paperwork at your earliest convenience.”

“Thank you, Miller.” Phil says, relishing the tiny victory, and settles in for a night of reading.

Phil reads through hundreds of pages of information, notices the abrupt shift in the pair’s targets two years before their “deaths”. There is no question that Clint Barton is Hawkeye, and there’s even less question that Natasha Romanov is Natalia Romanova is the Black Widow. The shift in targets had been the thing that moved them off S.H.I.E.L.D’s enemy lists onto their list of recruitment prospects. No one could ignore that the pair of assassins had been specifically targeting people that led child trafficking rings and other similarly unsavory activities. Bad people, was the technical term they used in the industry. Hawkeye and the Black Widow only preyed on bad people, which meant that by and large, their goals were mostly aligned with S.H.I.E.L.D. Their work was clean, precise, almost without identifiers if you didn't count the arrows that might as well be labelled "HAWKEYE". Maria Hill had led the recruitment team, but before the team could approach and make their first offer, the bodies of Hawkeye and the Black Widow had been found in the charred husk of a small apartment in Budapest.

Even though Phil knows the photographs aren’t a picture of the truth now, he still cringes when he sees the burnt and battered and broken bodies, remarkably similar in height and build to the people he knows as Clint and Natasha, and now also knows as Hawkeye and the Black Widow.

Phil rests his head on his desk, letting his nose bump against the file folders neatly stacked in front of him. He peers up at the photographs of Clint Barton, caught in grainy black and white, confidently drawing an elegant recurve bow. He has a serious, focused expression on his face, worlds away from the friendly congeniality that Phil is more familiar with. His hair is shorter than it is now, his body perhaps a bit more muscled and a lot more tense, but it’s definitely him. Improbably, Phil thinks, Clint has managed to get even more attractive. Well, _fuck_.

 


	5. Chapter 5

Clint stares at his phone for what feels like hours, but is actually only forty five minutes of fretting, pacing, and generalized anxiety. He has also nervously sculpted half a spool of floral wire into a poodle.

“Coulson.” The voice on the other end answers, confidently professional, and Clint takes a deep breath and steadies the ba-dumph-dump of his heart.  
“Is that really how you answer the phone, dude?” Joke. He starts with a joke. People like jokes?

“Who is - “

“It’s Clint, from Arachnoflora."

“Oh.” Phil says, his voice suddenly sounding tiny.

“Soooo...I was wondering if you’d like to come with me to the Flower District on Friday. I’d like your opinion on some - er - some interesting leaves that could go really great with Maria’s bouquet?” Doh. Couldn’t think of something better than “leaves,” Barton? Interesting leaves?

“Um.” Phil says.

“I go really early, at dawn, so I understand if you can’t make it. Five in the morning, but I’ll buy you coffee if you can make it!” And there. He’s said it. It’s kind of a date, he thinks. Buying coffee counts as a kinda date. Given, it’s an extraordinarily inconvenient time and place for Phil, but if he’s reading the signals right, and he’s pretty sure he is...

There is a pause over the phone, and Clint starts to panic, thinks he’s said something wrong, or maybe five in the morning really is very inconvenient, or maybe he’s misread the cues entirely, but come on, he’s Hawkeye, he doesn’t misread things, at least not that badly.

“Yes!” Phil yelps over the phone, and Clint can’t stop himself from smiling, thinking of how adorable the other man must look, probably flushed and not a little bit stammery. He’d be lying if he didn’t admit that he loves the effect he has on Phil, loves the fact that the most badass man he’s ever seen in action is apparently reduced to being a teenage girl around him. Or maybe just in the presence of his ass, but Clint doesn’t frankly care that much about the details.  
“Wonderful. There’s a Starbucks near 28th and Broadway, does that sound good?”

“Yes. Yes, that sounds great.” Phil says, his voice slipping back into something calm and self assured. “I’ll see you then. Friday. Five am.”

“See you Friday.” Clint says, and if he remains grinning stupidly at his phone for a couple minutes after Phil hangs up, well, no one needs to know that.

  
\---

  
Phil makes his coffee extra strong that morning, because he is going to meet Clint Barton for coffee and a walk through the Flower District, and he is going to wear a suit that he knows makes him look great, and he is going to be charming and funny and awesome. He is doing this because he is not stupid, and he knows that florists do not tend to invite their clients on early morning strolls, and this is definitely a kinda-date.

And Phil Coulson can handle this, can hold a conversation with Clint Barton without tripping on his own tongue, because he is apparently going to recruit Clint Barton and Natasha Romanov to S.H.I.E.L.D. So, it’s a kinda-date, but it’s also a kinda-mission, and Phil might be extraordinarily bad at kinda-dates, but he is extraordinarily exceptional at kinda-missions.

Clint is already standing at the Starbucks when Phil rounds the corner from the subway station, and he’s already holding two cups of coffee. Phil gives himself thirty seconds to let his eyes crawl over the other man, appreciating his short pea coat and soft woolen scarf. The scarf is fuzzy, and looks hand knit, the fibers already slightly felted together, and Phil wonders what it would feel like to touch it, to dip a little into Clint’s endless expanse of warmth.

“You don’t have a fancy coffee order, do you? This would be embarrassing if you did.” Clint says, smiling and handing one of the paper cups to Phil.

No, Phil thinks, what’s embarrassing is those pants you’re wearing(Get it together, Phil, they’re just tight jeans. Everyone wears tight jeans these days). Jesus, son, put those thighs where children can’t see them. “No, just lots of sugar. Thank you, but you have to let me buy coffee the next time.” Phil says.

“Next time?” Clint teases, “I haven’t even shown you a good time yet.”

“I rolled out of bed at four thirty in the morning for you, Clint. You’d better be showing me a spectacular geranium.” Luckily, Phil is a morning person, although he'd prefer to be rolling _into_ bed for Clint Barton. 

“Ooooh yes, I hope you have a thing for bromeliads.” Clint says, steering Phil down the street with a light hand on his arm. Phil does not have a thing for bromeliads - he’s not even sure what a bromeliad is - but he certainly has a thing for Clint, so he goes happily.

"Do you know anything about bachelor parties?" Phil asks, as Clint pokes through a bucket of daffodil bulbs.

"Absolutely. I'm great at bachelor parties.” Clint says, with the sort of wicked grin that strikes Phil with an image of a very undressed Clint wrapping himself around a stripper pole.

“I don’t mean to be presumptuous, or rude, but I meant _organizing_ them.” Phil says dryly, and Clint laughs, which is a sound that Phil is starting to think ranks up there with angels singing and babies remaining silent.

“Is this for the man marrying Maria?"

"Yeah, he's my other best friend. I'm pulling double best man duty."

"Well, I am less of an expert on bachelor parties for men that are marrying women, but I can help. Traditional? Stripper poles? Kidnapping?"

"Ixnay on the kidnapping, I think. That could go poorly." Jasper Sitwell's focus is in operations intelligence, and spends most of his time desk bound, but it still wouldn't be a wise choice to try to bag the man.

“So, what do you do for a living anyway, secret agent man?” 

“I’m a secret agent man." Phil says, in the most deadpan voice he can muster. He can’t actually lie, not if he’s going to try and recruit Clint at some point.

“No shit, really?” Clint says, but he doesn't look surprised. 

“Well, I’m an agent. I'm also a man. It’s not a secret now that you know.”

They stroll down the street, Phil following Clint as he happily ducks into small alcoves filled with exuberant bursts of colour and potted trees that look too tall and out of place amongst the concrete and stone of New York. In the stores, leafy plants reach the ceilings, transforming crowded ancient shopfronts into forest wonderlands. The air is brisk and warm and humid in the early summer air, and Phil feels like a different man, someone lighter, someone fulfilled. Clint has dropped the illusion that he was ever out to show Phil flowers for Maria’s bouquet, and Phil doesn’t hold to the pretense either, letting himself enjoy the kinda-date which is probably definitely a date. Clint is apparently conversant in both Vietnamese and Italian, though he speaks both with a heavy and unmistakably charming American accent. Combined with a dose of flirty bargaining, it’s enough to get him a large discount on a crate of potted orchids(from an elderly lady that pinches his cheeks and calls him _con trai_ ), and an especially lush ficus.

Phil carries the ficus, feeling a bit like a schoolboy helping to carry his crush’s books, which is probably an apt descriptor for the situation.

There is only one problem, Phil thinks. The problem looks like two men, dressed in black, and with the tell tale sign of both body armour and holsters under their bulky coats. The problem is that he has been tailed by said men for the past fifteen minutes, and they are large and imposing, and while Phil doesn’t have any illusions that Clint wouldn’t be able to take care of himself, he’d rather avoid...a scene.

“Clint, this has been great, but I have to go to work.“ Phil says, appreciating the disappointment in Clint's eyes. But if he can get away from Clint, he can take care of the muscled brutes, preferably somewhere secluded and with minimal civilian intervention. Better still, he might be able to disappear into the crowd, an impossible task with the glowingly gorgeous man he's walking next to.

“Would you look at that, it’s already eight.” Clint says, and Phil realizes that he has been walking up and down West 28th between 6th and 7th Avenue for three hours, chatting idly beside Clint as the other man went about his florist duties (although, Phil also has a very strong suspicion that Clint doesn’t usually take three hours to pick up a crate of potted orchids and a ficus). Phil steals a quick glance at the two men, who are now quickly and steadily approaching their position, and does not miss that Clint follows his eyes to come to the same conclusion.

“Have to go to work, huh? I suspect there’s something you need to tell me.” Clint says, hooking a strong hand around Phil’s elbow and pulling him into the store they’re standing in front of, which is a downtrodden looking floral supply store.

“Yes, there is something I need to tell you.” Phil says, looking around for a weapon. He’d chosen to go unarmed for the morning. A regretful decision, but considering the civilians around, probably not the worst one. He settles on a long bamboo pole that would suffice as a nice staff if he ends up having to fight in close quarters. 

“Well, there’s something I need to tell you too.” Clint admits, looking inside another bamboo pole, which he tosses aside quickly. Steadily headed towards the back of the store, he grabs a small length of PVC pipe and a bag of bamboo skewers instead. Phil tosses a twenty dollar bill to the nervous looking man behind the counter. 

At the front of the store, a small commotion is ensuing, as the two brutes attempt to muscle their way past the crowd in front of the store. The ficus and crate of orchids are left forgotten as Clint guides Phil out the back door, calmly but quickly. Out in the alley, he turns to look at Phil.

“So, the thing I need to tell you.” Clint says, his fidgety hands starting to unravel a chunk of yarn off the end of his scarf.

“I’m pretty certain you can tell me later.” Phil assures him.

They run.

The chase leads them out of the Flower District, down a couple of city blocks. Phil tries to keep up with Clint, who is a little bit faster. It turns out that even when he’s running for his life, he can take the time to appreciate the way Clint’s back half looks when he’s running for his life.

“Well, this was a fun date.” Phil gasps, making a tight right turn into a small, long and narrow alley. He’s perfectly fit, but it’s still a bit early in the morning for a life threatening high cardio workout, and he certainly isn’t a young man anymore.

“Hey, Phil, I’ve got good news and bad news.” Clint yelps, as the alleyway turns into a smaller, narrower, and significantly shorter alley. 

“Is the good news that the first three hours was a very nice date?”

“No, the good news is that no one has shot at us, so they’re probably not trying to kill you. Or _me_ , I suppose, but I’m pretty sure they’re after you.” Clint says, skidding to a stop behind a large dumpster. “But yes, it was a very nice date, and if I live through the next twenty minutes, I’d really like to do it again.”

“And the bad news?” Phil asks, ducking down next to Clint. He's pretty sure they're after him too. Fuck HYDRA. Always ruining perfectly nice dates.

“Bad news? Yeah, that building right there?” Clint points to the building to their left, the one forcing the alley into a dead end. “That building was definitely not there the last time I was pursued down this alley.”

Phil sighs, and crouches into a fighting position, his makeshift staff held at the ready. Next to him, Clint is fidgeting with a long strand of yarn from his scarf, wrapping the fluff tightly around the ends of the bamboo skewers into little balls. The PVC pipe he had grabbed from the store is lying at his feet, seemingly forgotten. Phil looks away, and trusts that Clint has not just suddenly chosen this moment to embark on a new summer camp craft project.

Around the corner, the brutes come into view. Phil groans as they barrel towards him. He steps out and forward, and grips his bamboo pole tightly. He can do this, he’s been trained to fight two men at once with just a stupid stick. But, just as quickly as they appear, Phil hears a soft “ffffth thwick” noise, and the first man falls to the floor, a bamboo skewer embedded in his throat. Okay, fight _one_ man, then. He can definitely do that. But, the second goes down just as quickly, an identical bamboo skewer in an identical spot in the identically beefy throat. He spins around, to see Clint, still holding a piece of PVC pipe to his lips, and until now, Phil has never been envious of a piece of mass manufactured plastic construction material.

“Uh, their breathing is gonna hurt a lot so they won’t be able to do much, but they’ll live. If you want to...er, question them, I guess.” Clint tosses the improvised blowgun into the dumpster and grins at Phil, a roguish, clever grin that Phil has absolutely, positively, no idea what to do with.

“Wow.” Phil says. He sets his own unnecessary bamboo staff aside. He also disarms the two men, although picking guns up from the ground is certainly nowhere as impressive as the other alternatives. Did he just get _rescued_? He’s never gotten rescued before, not this way. He's pretty sure he just got rescued. It feels...huh, it feels really, really nice.

“Sorry, did you want to show off how badass you are? I didn’t mean to steal your thunder.” Clint is smirking now, and there’s pretty much nothing Phil would rather do that grab Clint by his stupid fluffy unravelling scarf and kiss the smirk right off his stupid face.

So, you know, he does. He'll blame the adrenaline later.

Clint squeaks a little as their lips press together, and by gods, Phil thinks, with the brain cell he has remaining - that is simply _adorable_. It takes less than half a second after that for Clint's lips to be soft and yielding and just as persistent. Phil stops thinking and gives in to the fact that yes, he is actually making out with the hottest person he's ever met against a brick wall in a gross alleyway, and it is the best thing ever.

“Wow.” Clint says as they part. “That was really great.”

“Yeah.” Phil says, the adrenaline still running through his veins.

“Ackkkk. Gurgle.” Their vanquished foes say, still grasping at their throats.

"I probably have to call this in, get a cleanup crew in here." Phil says, looking around regretfully. The downed men are starting to twitch, and he should really give S.H.I.E.L.D. a shot at interrogating them.

"Do you have to stay here while they clean up?" Clint asks, an impossibly rakish look crawling over his face.

"No, why?"

"Because I'd like to take your suit off with my teeth and suck your cock like it's the last cock I ever get to suck."

Phil blinks.

"In case that was an unclear simile, I really love sucking cock." Clint clarifies.

Er. Yeah. Holy shit. That. Okay, Phil's cock definitely twitched at that(twitch is an...understatement, so to speak). They’re definitely on the same wavelength now. That bodes well. Maybe they’ll be on the same wavelength later too, about the recruitment thing, but in this instance, Phil only has a limited amount of mental energy to expend, and that mental energy wants to be expended on enthusiastically mutual cocksucking.

"Um, do you live nearby?" Phil asks, trying desperately to sound reasonably smooth, but jesus, he's just been _rescued_ , he's allowed to stammer a little.

Clint does not live nearby, he lives in a shitty loft in Bed Stuy, which is why the very distinguished and very proper Agent Phil Coulson finds himself in the cargo hold of a flower delivery van with his pants shoved down around his ankles. The van is parallel parked on 6th Avenue, and Phil hopes to god that Clint had put enough money in the meter, because this would certainly be an improper time to offer Clint his spare change.

"So, was there something you wanted to ask me?" Clint asks, after he has left Phil's cock soft and wet, and Phil is left lying on the hard floor of the van, gasping for breath next to a stack of oddly shaped rattan baskets.

Recruit him, a small voice in Phil head says, but Phil doesn't need to be a rocket surgeon to know that that would definitely ruin the mood. And, a recruiter should always have the higher ground, and Phil currently does not.

"Hrglrrrh." Phil says, reaching up to grab at Clint's hard inseam to at least attempt to reciprocate his work. "Date? Dinner? Glurgghhh?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Footnotes!
> 
> 1\. What Clint makes out of PVC pipe, bamboo skewers and yarn is a modified blowgun and its darts, vaguely following the principles behind a [Cherokee blowgun](http://www.cherokeeheritage.org/attractions/blowguns/).


	6. Chapter 6

“Are you fucking kidding me?” is the first thing that comes out of Maria Hill’s mouth as she steps into Phil Coulson’s office, coming immediately after a much calmer “Hey, you missed my HYDRA briefing this morning.” Phil squirms uncomfortably as she rakes her eyes over his rumpled form. He doesn’t keep an iron in his office, because Phil has managed a decade of looking extremely put together, through surprise shootouts and daring escapes, and even an explosion or two. But, apparently an hour in the back of a flower delivery van with one Clint Barton, codename Hawkeye, is enough to make him look like he just got laid in the back of a flower delivery van. Which of course, is exactly the case. Which of course, is exactly what Maria Hill is busy frowning about.

“That is not an acceptable recruitment method.” Maria crosses her arms and hovers over Phil. He hasn’t said a word, and she knows. “Not that I haven’t thought about it, because I will admit that Clint Barton is a very attractive man. But jesus, Phil. What the fuck?”

“I did not intend for anything to happen.” Phil says, because there really is no point in lying to Maria, especially not when she’s raising that eyebrow that might as well say “Phil, you smell like semen and guilt.”

“Phil, you know that I want you to be happy.”

“You know, we don’t have fraternization rules, it’s not - “ Phil starts.

“This is not about fraternization rules! This is about _trust_. Does he even know who you are?”

“”Is this about your flowers again?” Phil tries to evade Maria’s furious line of questioning.

“I don’t fucking care about the flowers! I care about _you_. Believe it or not, I also care about Hawkeye and the Black Widow. I chased them around the world for two fucking years. I fucking cried when I thought they were dead. And I’m not going to let you fuck up their recruitment to S.H.I.E.L.D., which I truly believe will be good for them, just because you’re more concerned about sucking our golden boy’s cock.” Maria pounds her fist on Phil’s desk, and Phil tries not to jump, and does not succeed. “I’m going to Delaware one week before my wedding, on a stupid HYDRA lead that’s probably completely useless, because you’re still fucking grounded. Try to not dip your dick in your friendly neighbourhood assassin while I’m gone.”

Maria storms out, and Phil gingerly sinks his head down onto his desk. His phone vibrates under a stack of papers, and he considers ignoring it, but fumbles for it anyway. Because, it might be Clint.

“Hello secret agent man. Are we still on for tomorrow night?” Clint’s voice is light and breezy and smooth and a little bit nervous and hesitant and Phil wants to bash his own forehead into his desk repeatedly.

Get out now, Phil thinks. Say no. Decline gracefully, turn the recruitment over to Maria, and then ask for a reassignment to the Antarctic field office for six months while Hawkeye and the Black Widow undergo their agent briefing and training.

“Yes, we’re on.” Phil says.

\---

“Your face looks weird.” Natasha says, when Clint is situated carefully and sorely behind the counter at Arachnoflora, picking absentmindedly at a rosemary bush which makes the entire store smell like pork chops. He ignores her. She knows of course, because she always knows. But, he is also on the very short list of people(the list is one person long) that can resist her interrogation methods, because, well, he hasn’t been scared of her for a long time. Not since that time early in their partnership, where they were cooped up in an igloo they built in Nova Scotia with nothing to eat but a crate of beans. After having to cuddle up to a compulsively farting master assassin and spy in order to not freeze to death - yeah, Clint’s just not afraid of the Black Widow anymore.

So, he continues to pay Natasha no mind, bustling about the store with the biggest grin on his face, and he knows it is absolutely getting on her nerves. Her glare is starting to physically heat up the room, when their door chimes and a young girl, about nineteen, bursts in.

“Hello? Welcome to Arachnoflora!” Clint says, because that’s what he says every time someone comes in the front door. The girl looks around, taking in the place with a thoughtful look on her face, and then walks up to the counter, lightly resting her elbows on it.

“Hey, uh, are you guys hiring?” she asks, her eyes darting between Natasha and Clint.

“No.” Natasha says, as Clint shrugs apologetically. That much is true - they actually can’t afford to hire anyone right now.

“What about an internship? For college credit? My dad says I should get a job, but I don’t really need the money. Um, I mean, it’s not like I’m rich or anything, I mean, I am, but I also want to work. And...er...I like flowers? I'm great at flowers."

Clint frowns at her, but he likes her metaphorical balls. “What’s that?” he asks, pointing to a potted cabbage rose on the counter. It’s a softball question, she could say “a potted rose” and she would be quite correct.

“ _Rosa centifolia_.” she answers. “Also known as a cabbage rose, or provence rose.”

Clint’s eyes dart across the room to see Natasha’s eyebrows raise. She stays silent, so that’s about as much of an affirmation he’s likely to get today.

“What about that one?”

“ _Narcissus papyraceus_. Paperwhite daffodil. Are you seriously going to quiz me on every flower in this shop before you let me work for free?”

“Just one more. That one.” Clint says, gesturing at his favourite bromeliad. It’s a short stumpy plant that he keeps by the counter, and it’s been there as long as the store has. He also doesn’t know its scientific name, and this might be a good time to learn.

“I have no idea what the hell that thing is.” she says. “But I can probably learn.”

Clint chuckles, and the girl giggles along, and he can see Natasha trying not to smile.

“Alright, you’re hired. Sort of hired. We're not paying you. My name is Clint.“ he says. “Over there is my partner Natasha, but she’s in a mood today, so we’ll say hi to her next time.”

“Kate. Kate Bishop.” she says, sticking out her hand. Clint shakes it, and her handshake is firm, but his eyes are drawn to her other arm.

“Huh, you’re an archer.”

“How did you know?” She scowls at him, her eyes narrowed suspiciously.

He gestures at her left arm, and at the red chafed streak down her inner forearm. “Apparently not a very good archer.”

“Fuck you, I’m great.” she retorts, rubbing her arm self consciously. “I was just distracted.”

“Getting cocky, not wearing an arm guard?” he prods at her.

“Look, buster, I don’t know who you think you are -” she starts, and is immediately cut off by Clint’s howl of laughter. Ten feet away, even Natasha starts to chuckle.

\---

Phil arrives at Arachnoflora at seven thirty at the evening, exactly thirty minutes past closing time, because Phil is punctual. The store appears closed(mostly because of the "closed" sign), but there is a light on in the back room, so Phil pushes the unlocked front door open. The door chime is followed by a "thwack" sound from the alley, so Phil proceeds in that direction, his hand resting lightly on his sidearm.

Phil sticks his head out into the alley to see a row of makeshift targets(a contraption of newspapers and floral foam). A young girl in a purple t-shirt and a giant grin on her face is letting loose an arrow with a bright purple recurve bow. The arrow splits an arrow already embedded in the stack of newspapers, and she lets out a victorious whoop as Clint takes the bow from her. He closes his eyes as he pulls back the string on the bow, which looks laughably small in his hands. The girl is trying to look unimpressed. He lets the string go, and the arrow splits the arrow that has already split an arrow.

Phil can’t help it, he claps. 

"Oh jeez, Phil. Fuck, I lost track of time." Clint swears as he startles, handing the bow back to the girl.

"Nice shooting." Phil says, because it really is quite impressive. _Hawkeye_ , he reminds himself. Don’t get too close, although that reminder is a little bit late, considering that he’s standing in Clint’s flower shop, about to take Clint out to dinner.

“Oh god, why are you wearing glasses?” Clint asks, and Phil could swear that even in the dim alley light, the man is actually blushing.

“Because I’m short sighted.” Phil answers, watching Clint practically shake himself out of a haze. He makes a mental note to wear glasses more often, since that apparently does it for Clint. And he definitely wants to do it for Clint. With Clint. On Clint, under Clint, he’s really not that picky.

"Er, yeah. Kate, this is Phil. Phil, this is our new intern, Kate. She's an archer too - wait, I've told you I'm an archer, right?" Clint scratches his head awkwardly as Kate pulls the arrows out of their targets, her bow slung casually over her shoulder.

"I think so. Yes." Phil says. He’s not actually sure, but it seems like a good answer since he's already read about a hundred and twenty pages of Maria’s reports about Hawkeye.

"Katie-kate, I gotta go. Can you clean up out here? Thanks for letting me play with your bow." Clint nods to Kate, who salutes with an easy smile and starts demolishing the makeshift target structures.

Phil would generally be annoyed at the situation, because Phil appreciates people who remember their own schedules and are ready for dinner dates when they say they will be, but Clint has already pulled him into the small back room, mumbling an apology or two, and immediately begins to tug his own shirt off.

"Clint, usually I'd be impressed by your enthusiasm, but this room is your impressionable young friend's only way back into the store." Phil says, trying to both retain a modicum of control and hungrily run his eyes over Clint’s torso at the same time, which is inherently a difficult task.  

"Phil, usually I'd be impressed by your enthusiasm, but I'm actually just trying to change my shirt." Clint grins, but he does crowd Phil up against the wall and kiss him with purpose, so Phil stops considering a quick retort and lets himself enjoy the rough brush of Clint's face against his own.

“I’ve spent all day thinking about you,” Clint groans into Phil’s ear, and Phil tries not to consider that he has also been thinking about Clint all day. And, about how deep he’s digging his own ditch. Here lies Phil Coulson, rendered completely dead by one Mr. Clint Barton. Here lies Phil Coulson, sucker for a pretty face and maker of bad decisions. Here lies Phil Coulson, unravelled, undone, unhinged by a pair of twinkling green eyes. Here lies Phil Coulson, a nice butt killed him, but oh boy, it was a really nice butt. So, Phil goes ahead and does exactly what every rational instinct is telling him not to do. Rational instinct is concerned with his job, his reputation, and not being a lovestruck idiot making out with a gorgeous man in a stock room. But Phil is not operating on rational instinct, not today, not with this perfect butt in his hands.

Clint eventually does get around to changing his shirt, to a dark purple button down shirt that makes Phil’s mouth go dry. It turns out that even with Kate Bishop banging on the door, yelling obscenities and threatening to quit her newly acquired unpaid internship, Phil still has enough time before dinner to make sure that Clint also has to change his pants. 


	7. Chapter 7

"Alright Sitwell, what kind of woman do you like?" Phil asks, taking in the women on stage and scattered around the room. "I read that a traditional best man's duty includes acquiring lap dances for the target bachelor."

Jasper Sitwell shrugs, looking a bit uncomfortable. Near the front of the room, a small smattering of S.H.I.E.L.D. agents, Sitwell’s brother-in-law, and his old college roommate are hollering appreciatively at an extraordinarily flexible woman dressed as a heavily tattooed Snow White. Jasper, however, has chosen to hang back by the bar, and is clutching onto a glass of cranberry juice like it might be the most important place to put his hands today. "I don’t know? Smart and funny? Phil, I've never been in a strip club before."

"I've never been in this sort of strip club either. And while your criteria is very noble, I don’t have time to evaluate your prospective lap dancers on those particular attributes. What are your preferred physical attributes in women?" Phil asks, toying with his club soda. He’s the designated driver. Not that it matters, since Sitwell seems to be downing cranberry juice as if he were trying to treat a persistent urinary tract infection.

"Er, dark hair?" Sitwell says, wincing as a gorgeous brunette brushes up against his shoulder on her way onstage.

"I really need more than that."

"Competent?" Sitwell offers.

"I actually chose this club because it is one of the more exclusive. It only hires women who are at least working on their postgraduate degrees." Phil says. He’s not being snarky; Clint had specifically recommended the place and assured him that the strip club was a worker cooperative run by the dancers themselves. Apparently, it was started by a group of industrious MBA students from NYU.

"No shit, really? Er...short and curvy, then?" Sitwell said, his eyes darting around the room nervously.

"Really? Maria is - "

"Tall, and not all that curvy, and I would really appreciate it if you didn't repeat any of this." Sitwell sighs, bleakly focusing his attention back on his drink.

Phil circles the room a couple times, chatting and distributing cash to two women that match Sitwell’s description, and another that looks enough like Maria Hill, just in case. Sitwell looks a little bit alarmed as the women approach him. The group of giggling women usher Sitwell to an very plush looking chair and settle him in it, as Sitwell pleads for deliverance with his eyes. Not that kind of deliverance, just the kind that makes Phil chuckles into his drink. Phil leans back against the bar and shrugs in Sitwell’s direction. If Sitwell enjoys himself, then Phil has done his job as his best man. If Sitwell is terrified, then well, he probably deserves it for the New Orleans dress incident.

“What’s the problem, sweetheart?” the bartender says, leaning over the bar and displaying a pair of objectively good breasts.

“Nothing. Just, uh, not my scene.” Phil pokes at the ice in his soda.

“Huh. Are you gay or weird?” she asks.

“Definitely the former, but possibly both?” Phil smiles.

“I could wave my friend over to keep you company.” she offers, gesturing at the male bartender on the other end of the bar. The other bartender is attractive by any standard, a tall-dark-handsome sort of good looking. He doesn’t look anything like Clint Barton, though.

“No, it’s okay, I have someone.” Phil says, and nearly chokes trying to put the words back into his mouth. His brain has apparently decided that Clint is his _someone_ , and ack, no, slow down brain, this is dangerous territory, thinking of the man that you’ve only been on two dates with as your someone, especially when that man is also Hawkeye, and you’re supposed to recruit him, not suck his cock, not that it isn’t a bit too late for that anyway. Christ, Phil thinks, the only way he could be more fucked would be if he were literally taking it up the ass at this specific instance, which is actually a nice - no, no, he will not think that thought. This night is about Jasper Sitwell, and his awkward bachelor party, not about Phil and his awkward feelings about Clint Barton.

After watching Jasper Sitwell get danced on for thirty minutes, Phil decides to take pity on his best friend.

"So, er, having a good time?" Phil waves the women away, who blow kisses in their direction as they leave.

"Yeah, it's great." Sitwell looks like a horse without blinders in rush hour traffic.  

"What's the problem?" Phil feels a bit sorry for his friend now. He’s not a bachelor party expert, but he’s pretty sure the bachelor isn’t supposed to look that pathetic.

"None of them are Maria.” Jasper Sitwell admits, more than a little sheepishly. ”I mean, ugh, how more of a lovesick sap could I possibly be? I'm surrounded by gorgeous women at my own bachelor party, and all I can think of is how much I'd rather be hanging out with my fiance."

Phil can’t stop thinking about Clint either. They had parted after their dinner - which is to say that Clint had spent thirty minutes enthusiastically crowding him up against a streetlamp like some scene out of a particularly overwrought romance movie, not that Phil minded at the time - but since Phil didn’t exactly want to invite Clint over to his S.H.I.E.L.D. issue apartment, and Clint had mumbled something about a roommate, they had made dinner plans for the day after Sitwell’s bachelor party. Although, the look in Clint’s eyes when he’d said the word “dinner” implied that he seemed a lot more concerned about dessert. Phil shakes his memory of that look out of his head, because tonight is about Jasper Sitwell, not his ridiculous crush on a world class assassin turned stupidly hot florist.

"I think hanging out with your fiance is contrary to the point of a bachelor party, not that I care, except that she is also in Delaware tracking down a local HYDRA cell since apparently I'm grounded from HYDRA related missions while they're still trying to kill me. which, actually, also seems counter productive." Phil says.

"I know." Sitwell sighs, making a game attempt to focus on the current dancer more than the tablecloth.

Phil laughs, because Sitwell really is looking improbably dejected. Okay, enough of torturing his best friend. "What I'm hearing you say is that you wanna ditch your own bachelor party, get some late night takeout Thai food, a bottle of whiskey from the corner bodega, and watch bad reality television with your best friend in his shitty apartment?"

For the first time that night, Jasper Sitwell looks relieved. "Oh, fuck yeah."

\---

“His name is Phil Coulson.” Natasha says. They’re splayed out on the couch, drinking vodka from the same bottle. They don’t own a television, so Natasha is reading Dostoevsky, and Clint is reading back issues of Martha Stewart’s Weddings.

Clint sighs. It’s not the first time they’ve had this conversation, but it’s the first time she seems interested in approaching it in a straightforward manner. “I already know that. He’s in our customer database. Because we’re selling him flowers. You remember that, right?”

“He’s a field agent.” Natasha flips a page casually, reaches down to drink from the vodka bottle.

“He already told me that.” Phil has been pretty open about his “secret agent man” job, and Clint hadn’t felt it polite to press the issue further. Phil could be CIA or FBI or any other three letter agency, it’s not that he’s not paranoid, but Phil’s just... _Phil_.

“He works for S.H.I.E.L.D.” Natasha drops the bomb, waiting for the realization to creep slowly over Clint’s face.

“Wait, what? S.H.I.E.L.D.? The people that were trying to kill us?” Clint finally lowers his magazine.

“The reason why I had to fake our deaths five years ago. They were about to catch up with us. They were the only people who’ve even come close to cornering us.” Natasha sets her book down and stares at Clint.

“Tasha, I don’t know exactly what’s going on, but I know that Phil is not trying to kill us.” Clint says, turning his attention back to his stack of magazines. For good measure, he reaches over and takes another swig of vodka from the bottle. Sometimes, they drink in silence. Sometimes, they drink out their feelings. Today, Clint is hoping for the former, because he’s not really in the mood for Natasha’s mother henning. Really, the only thing he’s in the mood for is Phil, but Phil is at a bachelor party. That Clint had helped organize, with many thanks to his treasure trove of wedding industry knowledge - not an area he ever expected to be an expert in, but sometimes, you can’t really plan where life leads you.

“Be careful, Clint.” Natasha says, shaking her head sadly, and taking the bottle away from him.

“Christ, Natasha. Can you stop treating me like a five year old?” Clint snaps, because really, he’s a bit tired of all this. He just wants to arrange flowers, and go on long walks with Phil that end in bed(or at least in a semi-horizontal position; they haven’t actually made it to a bed yet), and he honestly doesn’t care that much what Phil does for a living. At some point, he’s going to have to tell Phil about the Hawkeye thing, but for right now, everything is good.

“That’s not what - “ Natasha starts.

“Oh no, it is. It’s always - Clint, do this. Clint, do that. Clint, you’re being dumb, listen to Mama Widow, she knows best. Jesus, do you even know how insufferable you are?”

“I’m just trying to protect - “

Clint is aware of how angry he is now, and he turns the full force of that anger on the closest target, which was the one he was aiming for anyway. “I don’t need your protection! Oh my god, Natasha, have you fucking forgotten that I’m a fucking assassin too? How did I even stay alive for the decades before I met you? It must have been a miracle! Yay, I’m now under the protection of the Black Widow, lord forbid anyone ever try to fucking date me, or she’ll eat them after I have sex with them, like a poaching praying mantis!”

“Praying mantises are insects. Spiders are arachnids.” Natasha is calm and composed, and that irritates Clint to no end.

“Is it because you’re jealous? Is it because I have a chance at having some semblance of a normal life, and you don’t? I mean, holy crap, it must really suck not being able to love or trust anyone. I don’t know how you do it.”

Natasha’s face twists, and Clint thinks wow, that barb actually might have stung. “Clint - “

“I’m not like you, Natasha. I - ” Clint mutters. He’s exhausted.

“Look, I feel really bad about - “.

“Oooh, did you accidentally have a feeling? Stop the presses.” Clint can’t resist one more jab, letting his pent up fury and strong Russian vodka dictate his words. He never misses, and he can see the blow land as cleanly as if he had thrown a physical punch.

They fall silent then, glowering at each other. It’s Natasha that breaks eye contact first, spinning abruptly on her heel and heading out the door without another word. She doesn’t slam the door, which is more disconcerting than if she had, but Clint is still far too unsettled to read the nuances of her actions.  

\---

“I’m drunk, you should come over.” Clint says, his voice slurred and drowsy, a moment after Phil has pulled his cellphone out from under the snoring Jasper Sitwell, who is sprawled out on the couch, a cardboard box of pad thai balanced precariously on his lap.

“I’m not sure that’s a good idea, Clint.” Phil rearranges Jasper into a relatively comfortable position, and tries to clean up the mess of take out containers on his coffee table.

“I want to cuddle. Come over. Wait a second - ” and Phil hears a crashing noise on the other side of the line and can't avoid cringing.

“Clint? Clint, are you okay?”

“Er, yeah, I just tripped, and I er, I don’t feel so good?” Clint mumbles. He sounds impossibly pathetic.

“Oh, you really are drunk. I’m coming over right now. What’s your address? Don’t stop talking to me.” Phil grabs his keys, already headed out the door. Jasper Sitwell will be okay. Nothing some aspirin won’t fix in the morning.

Phil manages to get to Clint’s place in just twenty minutes(this is impressive, for New York), trying to keep Clint on the phone as the other man mumbled sweet, drowsy nothings in his ear. Ten minutes into the drive, Clint drops the phone and makes an awful retching noise, and Phil realizes that somehow, Clint has wormed his way into a part of Phil that worries obsessively about people he cares the most about.

Clint’s apartment building in Bed-Stuy is - to be gentle - a fucking dump. Phil makes his way up the steps which smell a little like piss, and starts to feel reluctant about even trying to recruit Clint and Natasha. Obviously, they haven’t chosen to live like the assassins they once were - either that or they’re hoarding all of their cash - but the apartment building doesn’t appear to even offer the most minimal creature comforts. If he had to choose between Clint Barton or _Hawkeye_ \- well, that’s not even a question, although Phil knows it’s not as if the two can be separated. He nudges the door open to Clint’s apartment, finding Clint on the couch, looking miserable and clutching a five gallon bucket to himself.

“Phil!” Clint brightens up immediately. He tries to leap up from the couch in greeting, but only gets a couple inches off the couch before slumping back into the worn cushions.

Phil looks at the bucket. It is filled with more liquid that should emerge from any individual person. “How are you still so drunk after that?”

“I made more space. So, I drank more. But I don’t have any vodka anymore.” Clint shifts his feet around sheepishly and Phil resists the urge to collect the other man up in a comforting hug.

“Er, let me get you a glass of water and wash out that bucket.” Phil says, walking over to the small kitchen. He takes a quick overview of the place. It’s a lot smaller than he’d expected, and he’d already expected it to be really small.

“Nooo...I need the bucket.”

“I’ll get it right back to you.” Phil assures Clint, dumping the contents of the bucket in the sink. He washes it out with water; he’ll try and find some bleach later.

“Nooo...I need youuuuu.” Clint whines, making grabby hands at Phil.

Phil finally gives in after Clint has downed a glass of water, and sits down on the couch with a sigh. Clint immediately barnacles himself to the other man, wrapping his arms and legs around Phil.

“I like you, Phil.” Clint’s body is pliant and relaxed, and Phil wonders what he’s ever done to deserve this trust.

“I like you, too.” Phil admits.

“I know you like my ass. Everyone likes my ass.”

“No, I like all of you. Well, at this specific instance I don’t like the part of you that smells like used Chinese food, but I like all the other parts.” Phil reaches over to grab a notepad on the coffee table. It is blank, and Phil is not a wordsmith, but he can try. If Clint needs reassurance, he can provide it, because it’s silly that men like Clint should ever have any doubt about how amazing they really are.

“What parts of me do you like?”

“You’re too drunk to pay attention. I’ll write them down for later.” Phil grabs a pen and hovers over the notepad. How does he even start? He thinks Clint is gorgeous, of course - it would be simple to name every body part attached to Clint and write it down in neat cursive - but how can he capture in words the way Clint makes him feel? The nervous transcendence of Clint’s smile, the insistent trust in his strong hands. That hope that finally, Phil might actually have found a place to be happy.

“Are you mad at me?” Clint nuzzles into Phil’s neck like a lost puppy.

“No.” Phil says, because he isn’t.

“Good. Everyone’s mad at me. Tasha’s mad at me.” Clint burrows further into Phil, his voice sad and plaintive.

“Is that why you drank a bottle of vodka by yourself?”

“Half. It was already half empty.”

“Why was Natasha mad at you?”

“I don’t wanna talk about Natasha. I wanna have sex with you.” Clint demands, pushing Phil onto the couch insistently, although his straddling attempts are decidedly subpar tonight.

“Uh, no, I really don’t think that’s going to happen. “

“Please, I promise I’ll be good.” Clint begs, and Phil has to gently disentangle himself. He tries to firmly rearrange Clint into a sitting position, but Clint has gone as boneless as a particularly lazy octopus and falls off the couch, crashing to the ground with a loud yelp as hard footsteps ring out on the floor below.

“Clint!” Phil goes to collect Clint from the floor, who is not making any effort at all to help that process. Clint is now giggling furiously, gasping and wheezing with a brief pause to inhale some air.

“Clint, please get up - “ Phil starts, but the footsteps get louder, and the door of Clint’s apartment slams open. Phil pulls his gun instinctively, spinning towards the sound.

In the doorway, framed by the hallway light, is the Black Widow, her red hair a tangled mess, her eyes blazing in anger and terror. “Clint!” she shouts, her gun pointed directly at Phil, and Phil hopes to god that this is not the last moment of his life, because Maria Hill will be really pissed if he doesn’t make it to her wedding. “Are you okay, Clint?” the Black Widow says, and Clint grumbles something unintelligible that is unlikely to reassure anyone, but at least he clambers back onto the couch.

“He’s fine.” Phil says, his hand as steady as it has ever been, although his heart has never been so terrified. “He had a lot to drink. I just got here.”

The Black Widow glares at Phil, assessing him with the piercing stare of a thousand suns, or of a very angry best friend, whichever one is more intimidating. Next to Phil, Clint starts snoring.

“I rinsed out the bucket, but it could use some bleach.” Phil says.

“I heard him yell.” she says awkwardly, and in a second, she is Natasha again.

Phil lowers his gun first, placing it on the ground in front of him. “I think we have to talk.” He nods at her gun, making it clear that he knows that she's no florist.

Natasha puts aside her weapon as well, but does not turn away. “We do. But Clint is not in the state for it. Meet us at the store at opening.” She flips on the light switch, and Phil blinks to readjust to the sudden brightness.

“I know you care about him, but - ” Phil takes in the bags under her eyes, the slump of her shoulders. Natasha looks tired, the anger already extinguished and downgraded to exhausted disappointment.

“Arachnoflora, tomorrow morning. We open at eight thirty.” Natasha says, moving over to Clint. Clint is now apparently fast asleep, despite the racket, and she pulls up a crocheted blanket up over him, after checking his pulse. He breaths softly and smoothly, and Phil watches as Natasha plants a gentle kiss on his forehead. “He’ll be fine. Go home, or your car will get towed.” She picks up the empty bottle of vodka, and walks to the kitchen, ignoring Phil.

Phil leaves. He’s had a pretty rough night, so he doesn’t have the mental capacity to notice that Natasha Romanov, the Black Widow, willingly turned her back to him.


	8. Chapter 8

At eight thirty in the morning the next day, Clint Barton is hungover as fuck. He remembers everything clearly, a state assisted by the fact that Natasha has said no more than two words to him. Those two words were “Get up.” followed by an unsympathetic mug of coffee shoved in his hand. Natasha’s anger is something that has always stimulated his memory, mostly because he has never been allowed to apologize with only the vague outlines of what he’s done wrong.

However, judging by the fact that he had to step over two duffle bags sitting by their doorway, already stuffed with everything she owned, he’d gotten a pretty good idea of what she’s suggesting.

“Hi.” Phil steps into Arachnoflora, his hands shoved into his pockets.

“Will you let me handle this by myself?” Clint says to Natasha, not a little bit snappishly. Natasha, apparently still intent on the silent treatment, wanders off to the far end of the store, although he knows that she doesn’t need to be within listening distance to eavesdrop.

Phil shuffles his feet as he approaches the counter. He stops, and straightens up, meeting Clint's eyes. Even though Clint has seen the transformation several times now, he can feel his body react to the nervous Phil Coulson suddenly transforming into the brisk, professional, competent man that had caught Clint's attention the first time. 

“So, the thing I was going to tell you. I’m Agent Phil Coulson, and I work for S.H.I.E.L.D.”

“Is this when you tell me that I get a thirty minute headstart, and then your employers try and kill me and Natasha?” Clint jokes, but his throat hurts, his head still aches like a motherfucker, and he knows that the humour isn’t quite shining through. “Phil, I don’t care who you work for. Honestly.”

“Kill you? No, of course not. What?” Phil says, having the decency to look confused. “No, both of you haven’t been on our list for more than seven years.“

“Seven years? But S.H.I.E.L.D. was chasing us for two years -“

“We were trying to recruit you.” Phil says. “Um, Maria, the one getting married. She was lead on that. Until your untimely deaths in Budapest.“

Clint waits, waiting for the gears in his head to catch up with the words he’s hearing out of Phil’s mouth. “Recruitment?” he chokes out, finally.

Phil slides two folders across the counter. “Here is a preliminary offer from S.H.I.E.L.D. It is identical to the one we were prepared to offer the both of you five years ago, adjusted for inflation. It hasn’t been re-approved by my boss, but I can speak for S.H.I.E.L.D when I say that our goals align with yours.”

Clint stares at the folder, runs his fingers hesitantly over it, like it is coated in poison. He flips the one on top open, reading the letter on top. It promises a lot. It promises a steady paycheck. A roof over his head, no matter what. A break from a lifetime of running. Security, safety, and a chance to make the world a better place.

“We - we would be honored to count you and Miss Romanov amongst our assets. Your skills are unique and valuable to us, Mr. Barton.” Phil says, and it is a voice that sounds miles away from the shy, slightly frazzled, Phil that Clint has gotten used to, that Clint had gotten improbably attached to.

He dares to chance a glance at Phil, and god, that impassive expression has never hurt so deeply. He shoves the folder away angrily, because there is one thing it does not promise. One thing - no, one person - that he’d hoped for, and it is now a hope that is crumbling apart in a tower of lies built on stupid cups of coffee and floral design consultations and walks in the Flower District. Shit, he’s a fucking idiot.

“Recruitment?” Clint says again, rolling the hard and unexpected words over his tongue, because the truth is sinking in like a lead brick. All this - all Phil wanted - was _Hawkeye_? Just another asset. Just another blunt tool of destruction.  

Phil nods, and Clint has trouble reading the emotion on his face. Maybe because there isn’t one, he thinks bitterly.

“Tell me, Agent Coulson.” Clint spits out. “Does S.H.I.E.L.D. often send out their field agents to seduce potential recruits? Because I don’t think I like that way of doing business.“

“No, that’s not - “ A surprisingly hurt look takes over Phil’s face briefly, before it steadies into its irritatingly expressionless mask..

“I really put the _ass_ in asset, huh?” Clint throws the folder down on the counter, the papers scattering across the smooth surface.

“Clint, I -” Phil tries again.

“You’re welcome to make the same pitch to Natasha. If she doesn’t shoot you. Were you fucking her too, secret agent man?” Clint cuts him, already turning away. “Oh, and Phil?”

“Clint?” Phil says, and Clint pretends that he doesn’t hear that note of hope, tells himself that it’s the sort of acting he’d expect out of a professional secret agent man like Phil.

“Fuck you.” Clint slams the door to the back room as he leaves.

\---

Phil stands in shocked silence in front of Arachnoflora’s counter. That unravelled quickly, his more rational brain thinks. The rest of his brain wants to start wailing in a particularly undignified fashion. He doesn’t notice that Natasha has come up behind him, and taken Clint’s spot behind the counter, even though she isn’t making much effort to be silent. She replaces the scattered papers into the folders, reading them over slowly and carefully. From the alley, he hears the sound of a motorbike speed away.

“Dammit, he’s taken my bike.” Natasha says lightly. She flips through both folders, and hands Clint’s back to Phil. “I’ll keep this one.” she says, tucking her own offer packet away behind the counter.

Phil nods, dumbly, trying to plow past the fact that his heart is busy trying to break itself into a million pieces.

“It’s not just about recruitment.” Phil finally blurts out, because everything’s gone wrong, he might as well confess his innermost feelings to the Black Widow. “I - um, Clint - me and Clint - I…” He can’t do it, can’t pour out his heart to Natasha Romanov. It’s possible that his face is doing the job, because Natasha nods, and smiles gently. She’s certainly not cut out to be a therapist, but Phil thinks there’s a small glimmer of understanding there, and he’ll take it.  

“I have something for you too.” Natasha hands Phil a similar manila folder, but it is thicker. He opens it. In it, are grainy pictures of himself, in his old apartment, and Phil knows that it’s an image taken through a sniper’s scope. He flips the page, sees a printed kill order with his name on it. And under it, is a list of names and locations, half of them systematically struck out. Phil recognizes some of the struck out locations as HYDRA bases S.H.I.E.L.D has shut down in the past decade.

“What - ?” he says, because this is information that S.H.I.E.L.D has been searching for months to acquire. Even in his heartbroken haze, he knows that this is - “This information is priceless.”

“I know. I have some contacts that S.H.I.E.L.D. doesn’t.”

“Why? Not ten hours ago, you were pointing a gun at me. Ten _minutes_ ago, you were glaring daggers at me. So, why you helping us, Miss Romanov?”

“I’m not helping S.H.I.E.L.D. I’m helping you. I don’t trust as easily as Clint does. But, I’ve always been better at reading people. I reevaluated the mission based on new information at hand. Agent Phil Coulson, you’ve been a giant pain in my ass, but I don’t want you to die.”

“Thank you, Miss Romanov. I’ll try my best.” He hears his own voice in his ears, and he is certain that it is the most pathetic he’s ever sounded.

Natasha’s smile is wan, but oddly warm. “Go get ‘em, Phil. And I wouldn’t find a new florist yet, if I were you.”

\---

“Will you tell me what is so important that Nick Fury pulled me back from Delaware? Not that I was particularly enjoying it.” Maria snaps her head up as Phil slides into her office.

In response, Phil drops the folder he'd received from Natasha on Maria’s desk. “We got in some information from an interesting source. The analysts are already on it, but the short answer is, you didn’t need to be in Delaware.“

“Dammit, Coulson.” Maria sighs, rubbing her temples. “Well, the humidity was terrible, anyway.”

“And, your bachelorette party starts in an hour.”

“Phil, I didn’t want a bachelorette party. Did my sisters decide I needed one? Because that is so like them. I do not want to go to Chippendales, I do not want to wear a stupid hat, I do not want -“

“Stop freaking out, Maria. It’s just us. I just thought you’d like a calm break from the combined madness of getting married in a week, and tracking HYDRA cells down the eastern seaboard. We’re going for a pleasant late afternoon tea.” Phil says, leaning over to pull up a website for an extraordinarily frilly looking tea shop on one of Maria’s monitors.

“Afternoon tea?” Maria squeaks.

“Yes. Afternoon tea. There will be tiny scones and a lot of jam, and finger sandwiches, which I am assured are not sandwiches containing fingers.”

“Tiny scones? How did you even know - ?” Maria says, and the excitement on her face betrays the girlish obsession over miniature foods that no one but Phil Coulson would ever have figured out. His investigative abilities and interpersonal instincts are actually top notch in all matters not involving Clint Barton.

“I’ve been listening to you lose your mind over flowers and fluffy dresses for a few weeks. I took a good guess, but if I’m wrong, we can go visit some ponies this weekend.”

“Oh my god, you got me a pony?”

Phil tries to explain that he really just did a Google search for a petting zoo in the vicinity, but Maria Hill looks more delighted than she’s ever been, so Phil just starts helping her pack up his desk for the day, feeling a little bit satisfied that at least he can make _one_ person in the world happy.


	9. Chapter 9

Maria Hill waits until they get to the tiny tea shop to say anything about Phil's failed relationship and Phil's failed recruitment, because she was actually raised as a very polite girl. And also, she is kind of excited about tiny scones. Phil drives quietly, and she doesn’t ignore that the radio station is tuned to some of the most depressingly lovelorn music she’s ever heard.

“I’m sorry about Clint Barton,” Maria says, once they’re settled in a small table for two, with a pot of Earl Grey and a tower of finger sandwiches between them. Phil shifts uncomfortable in the narrow chair; the furniture in the place appears to be proportionally smaller, just like the tiny food. Next to them, two elderly ladies glance over, looking slightly amused.

“It’s fine. I fucked up. It’s not the first time.” Phil mumbles, shoving a miniature sandwich in his face. “I’m sorry I screwed up your recruitment, though.”

“Eh, they were mostly retired anyway.” Maria reaches for the jam. “I’ve cross referenced their methods with everything in our database and got only a couple of hits, and I’m still not a hundred percent certain about those. At least he didn’t kill you? That means he likes you, right?”

“What if he was just pretending to like me so he could kill me later?”

“Phil, you are actually being irrational now. You are aware of what Hawkeye is famous for, right? He doesn’t need to pretend to like anyone so he can kill them later. That’s the whole point of being a sniper.” Maria points out, taking a dainty sip of her tea.

Phil sighs, and slumps into the tiny, uncomfortable chair. Maria reaches out and pats his arm awkwardly. Phil is a good friend, he really is, but Maria doesn’t really have the social skills necessary to comfort a heartbroken friend with optimistic platitudes. She pours him another cup of tea, and considering it for a second, pulls out a small flask from her hip and adds approximately two shots of whiskey into the elegant teacup. Phil looks a little bit grateful. He knocks the cup of tea back in a manner completely unbecoming of a tea drinking gentleman, as the elderly women now glaring from one table over look appalled. Maria scowls at them, and the old broads look ready to deliver a lecture on class and ladylike behavior when the ceiling explodes, and the adorable little tea shop fills with smoke, and bits of powdery drywall. Well, _shit_ , Maria thinks, especially when masked men clad entirely in black body armour also fall from the ceiling.

Maria leaps up from her chair, her first instinct on evacuating the other shop patrons, because Phil can take care of himself. Next to her, she can see Phil fighting four masked men easily, his sidearm already in one hand, and a pot of tea in the other. One of them screams as the scalding water burns his face, but the shrieking noise only serves to drive one of the old women into a flailing panic.

The other one, a thin, grey haired woman with blue eyes and bright red lipstick, ducks down behind a plush chaise lounge, which Maria helps to flip over, even though she doesn’t think it’s much of a defense. Maria draws her firearm, noticing that the woman next to her is ignoring her wailing friend to dig through her own large brocade purse. The gun that the woman pulls out is decades old - a M1911 - that Maria knows was last manufactured in the ‘80s, and certainly hasn’t been seen in use recently.

“You are a SSR girl, aren’t you?” The woman says, her eyes narrowing at Maria. Her voice is steady and British accented, with no small hint of military service in it.

“Er, it’s S.H.I.E.L.D now, ma’am. Has been since right after World War II..” Maria’s answer is automatic, deferring immediately to the confident voice.

“Oh my. My memory isn't what it used to be. Well, what are you waiting for, child? Shoot!”

Maria obeys the command. She takes down one of the men easily with a precise shot, and cheers a bit internally as the old woman next to her lands a headshot on another.

“Thank you for your help, ma’am, but we should get your friend out of here.” Maria says, gesturing to the hysterical old lady, who is still sobbing loudly.

Maria guides the women to the entrance of the small shop, toppling over tables as a shield as they go. “Good luck, kiddo.” the woman with the M1911 says, and Maria nods. She doesn’t have time to introduce herself right now, she thinks, as the woman wrestles her friend down the street and away from the action.

Out of the corner of her eye, she sees Phil Coulson easily take down the last man, crushing a porcelain teacup into his masked face. But, another five men emerge from the back door of the shop. She ducks low and takes in the scene in front of her - the men are armed with tranquilizer darts, not bullets, and Maria isn’t sure whether to feel happy or terrified about that. She catches a glimpse of a patch on an attacker’s jacket sleeve - a red skull with tentacles, and well, _shit shit shit_. She pulls her sidearm, takes two of the new assailants out - with bullets, not tranquilizer darts - and she doesn’t feel bad about it. She should never have let Phil leave the building, not when there was still a HYDRA bounty out for his capture. But, Phil has always been the stubborn sort. She is faintly aware of a noise behind her, and when she turns around, everything goes dark.

When the NYPD finds Maria Hill, unconscious near the entrance of the tea shop, lukewarm tea and jam still sticky on her palms, Phil Coulson is long gone.

***

Clint packs quickly and efficiently, like he has so many times before in his life, although not recently. He likes New York. He likes Arachnoflora. But it’s not the first time he’s fallen in love with a city, and it’s certainly not the first time he’s fallen in love with a person. And this - this won’t be the first time he runs.

“What are you doing?” Natasha’s voice drifts in, and Clint knows that it’s really fucking obvious what he’s doing, especially since her own packed bags are still sitting by the door. He doesn’t turn around or answer, still reminded of their fight the other night, and angrily shoves another handful of t-shirts into his duffel bag. Natasha moves around him, vaguely present in his peripheral vision, and he ignores her. He feels the thick tension of her presence, assumes that she has settled in the bedroom doorway with her arms crossed, and an impatient scowl on her face. Clint swings the bag up over his shoulder, picks up his weapons case, and spins around. He’s ready to fight his way out of the apartment if he needs to, but he suspects that this time, Natasha will just let him go his own way.

He is surprised when he turns around, because Natasha is not glaring at him. Her bags have been relocated back inside their bedroom, and are now unzipped and partially unpacked, her clothing strewn messily over her bed. She’s leaning against the doorway, that much was accurate. But her eyes are downcast, her shoulders slumped and weary, and she’s fidgeting with a piece of paper. Clint is suddenly aware of how tired he is as well.

“I’m sorry.” Natasha says, and she sounds small, perhaps for the first time in her life. Clint startles, because apologies do not fall easily from Natasha’s lips. “I don’t want you to leave, because I think your instincts were right the first time, and I should have trusted you more.”

“Will you try to stop me?” Clint asks, still clutching onto his bag.

“No. But I’d prefer if you didn’t do it alone.”

“You’d follow me?” Clint has always followed Natasha, has always gone willingly with her like a lovelorn puppy, but he’d never taken the time to think that she would reciprocate.

“Of course I would follow you, if you’d have me.” Natasha says. “But, do you really want to leave?”

Clint tightens his grip on his weapons case, and looks numbly at Natasha. She reaches out to offer him the piece of paper she’s holding, which he now recognizes as a sheet from the notepad Phil was writing on the other night. He reads it. It is a short list, in Phil’s neat cursive.  

_Parts of Clint Barton that Phil Coulson likes._

_1\. His butt._

_2\. His eyes._

_3\. His hands._

Clint remembers that part, remembers laughing at the list and drunkenly snuggling further into Phil’s side, smelling the light clean scent of his soap and dry cleaning and feeling like he finally belonged someplace, finally belonged to someone, and had someone to care about in return.

_4\.  His easy confidence._

_5\. The way he inspires loyalty._

_6\. His unerring aim._

Clint bites his lip bitterly. These are the traits to be prized in Hawkeye, not Clint Barton, and he tries to remind himself that he can’t just be Hawkeye for Phil, can’t just be another asset, can’t be another sniper specialist for S.H.I.E.L.D.

_7\. He smiles, and my day instantly gets better. Must further examine this phenomenon._

_9\. He makes me feel like I’m home._

Clint blinks at the words on the piece of paper, aware that Natasha is sizing him up, and reading every expression that flickers on his face. He knows what she sees; he’s never been the stoic type. He knows that he looks heartbroken, and pained, well aware that every regret he’s ever had about Phil is etched on his face.

“I told him to fuck off.” Clint considers that perhaps that might have been a bit rash. He still feels distrustful, still feels a bit betrayed by Agent Coulson, but he’s always been the optimistic sort, mostly. Standing here, reading Phil’s words neatly written without pretense, he feels like he could dare to hope that perhaps he had been something more than just Hawkeye to Phil Coulson. He folds the piece of paper up, shoves it roughly into his pocket.

Natasha tucks a strand of stray hair behind her ear and reaches her hand out, and Clint willingly takes it. He wraps himself around her, resting in the quiet familiarity of his best friend.  

“Tasha, I’m sorry. About what I said the other night.” He apologizes into her hair.

“It’s okay. You weren’t wrong.”

“What are you suggesting?” he asks, finally. He drops his duffle bag to the ground. It’s always been him and Natasha, always has been, and the calm of her presence grounds him.

Natasha smiles. “Perhaps, we could stop running.”

***

“Tell me again, Fury. Why exactly have no orders given to suit up and retrieve Phil Coulson? I walked out of Medical just a minute ago, and no one knows that Phil has even been kidnapped by HYDRA?” Maria Hill is furious as she marches into Nick Fury’s office, her hands already tearing off a bulky bandage from around her head.

“That information is mission sensitive and classified. We will be going after Agent Coulson once we have the appropriate information.” Fury says. He does not look up from his desk, but there is a small furrow between his eyes.

Maria slams her fist down on his desk, not caring that she jostles the paperwork that Fury never does himself. “We have the information! Phil got it this morning. The analysts have been working overtime with the new information to figure out his most likely location, and we’ve already narrowed it down to two - “

“Information from an unnamed source, Hill. All of our field teams are currently deployed. I don’t have the resources to send two teams out to two different locations. We need to pool our resources. I can’t lose more good men on a wild goose chase.”

“Director Fury - but, it’s _Phil_. Don’t you fucking care about -”

Nick Fury stands up from his desk, and Maria steps back hurriedly, alarmed by the sudden anger in his eyes. “Don’t you _ever_ assume that I don’t - ”

He is cut off by the door slamming open, followed by Jasper Sitwell throwing himself into the room with a look on his face that manages to be both panicked and gleeful. “Er, you guys have to see this.” he says, quickly running out again. Fury shrugs, the curiosity replacing the anger, and they hurry after Sitwell as he heads in the direction of the lobby.

When they arrive in the lobby, Natasha Romanov and Clint Barton are standing there, with their hands in the air. Romanov is unarmed and looks improbably amused, but Maria has followed her long enough to know that she doesn’t need any weaponry to be lethal. Next to her, Clint Barton has his quiver looped casually around his shoulder, but his bow is unstrung and resting across his back. They are surrounded by more than twenty members of the S.H.I.E.L.D. security team, all of whom have their weapons drawn and pointed at the two figures dressed in black who are obviously trying to look as nonthreatening as possible. The Black Widow looks calm and collected. Hawkeye looks a little bit perplexed, but he still wiggles his fingers in a greeting when he sees her. “Hi, Maria.” he says, somewhat sheepishly, and Maria can’t help but think that even with his weapons slung around his back, he still looks more like a congenial florist than an assassin.

“What the hell going on here?” Nick Fury demands.

"My name is Natasha Romanov. I am the Black Widow. I am with Clint Barton, also known as Hawkeye. We surrender to Agent Phil Coulson." Natasha appears to be the designated communicator of the two assassins currently casually hanging out in the S.H.I.E.L.D. New York field office lobby.

“Agent Coulson is currently indisposed.” Maria says and notes the brief flicker of worry that crosses Clint Barton’s face.

“We’ll have to restrain you for now.”  Nick Fury says. “Will you come into S.H.I.E.L.D. custody?”

“Of course.” Natasha answers for both of them, lowering her arms to be cuffed.


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Extra short chapter for this week, because really, everyone knows what's happening already! Next week we can move the plot along more and get into more shenanigans!

“Miss Romanov, why did you decide to come in? There’s been no indication that you’ve ever been interested in working for S.H.I.E.L.D. Not that I haven’t been trying, you know.” Maria sits across a table from Natasha Romanov, in a cold S.H.I.E.L.D interrogation room. It’s not the setup she would prefer, but technically, the Black Widow and Hawkeye are still wanted criminals, and Phil Coulson’s recruitment paperwork wasn’t exactly pre-approved by the higher ups.

"Where's Coulson?" Natasha’s voice is sharp.

“It’s Barton, isn’t it? He’s been following you around for seven years. Are you trying to get rid of him? Find him a new place to roost, before cutting ties?” Maria tries.

“He hates bird puns, really. You shouldn’t make them around him. But, no.” Natasha says. “No, I think it’s quite the opposite, actually.” The smile that crosses Natasha Romanov’s face looks like she’s just discovered a truth unbeknownst to her before. “Is Phil Coulson your best friend?”

Maria swallows. Perhaps rendering personal information to the Black Widow isn’t the best move right now but -. “Yes.” she says. “He is.”

“Then, I think you get it.” The look on the Black Widow’s face is recognizable to Maria. She’s knows that its the look on her own face, worrying about Phil when he misses a check in, or trying to awkwardly comfort him after a bad date. And right then, she knows exactly what she is going to do with Hawkeye and the Black Widow.

"Here's the deal, Miss Romanov." Maria says, formulating the plan that will torpedo her entire career. "The intake process for SHIELD takes a minimum of fifteen days. Besides the extensive briefing and debriefing necessary for recruits such as yourself and Mr. Barton, the panel of medical testing, as well as aptitude testing, will assuredly take at least five days. During this time, you will be confined entirely to quarters, and cannot be part of any active mission, much less any requiring any more than a preliminary clearance level."

“What is the point, Agent Hill?” Natasha asks.

"The point is that my best friend has been kidnapped by HYDRA agents." Maria takes a deep breath. She needs them. She needs the Black Widow and Hawkeye if she has any hope of retrieving Phil Coulson. Natasha’s face falters slightly, before schooling itself back into blankness.

“I did not know that.” Natasha admits.

"Earlier today, he brought me a folder of information from an unknown source. We have used this information to narrow down on the base where he is most likely being held. I hope that this information is accurate."

"It is." Natasha says, and Maria smiles as her rational suspicions are confirmed.

"I will be headed to North Carolina today to follow up on a lead on this case. I will only be collecting intelligence. Unfortunately, neither you nor Mr. Barton can be assigned to the mission. Do you understand?” The information from Natasha had already narrowed Phil’s most likely location down to either North or South Carolina, and she already knew that she wouldn’t be able to do much more than observe and gather enough intel to dispatch a full S.H.I.E.L.D. retrieval team, but it was certainly more than sitting around waiting for better information to drop in their laps. But, if she had a team herself, talented and precise, however small -

"I do understand." There is a mischievous gleam in Natasha’s eyes, as she starts to comprehend what Maria has not yet said.

"Good." Maria stands, and taps a code into her tablet. I hope this works, she thinks, because this is definitely the end of my career. She’s not a technical genius; the override code is her own. Natasha glances down at her wrists as the electronic locks on her cuffs open.

"You have fifteen minutes before the alarms sound and the cameras and locks reactivate. Barton is in the room next to this one.” Maria swallows. “Please do not harm the agent that is in the room with him.” She’ll have to apologize to Jasper later. Hopefully, suggesting that a world class assassin knock her fiance out in order to escape S.H.I.E.L.D custody will not be a relationship deal breaker. “I recommend the ventilation ducts located in front of the women's bathrooms on this level. Go down, and east."

"Agent Hill, did you really think I couldn't escape if I'd wanted to?" Natasha asks.

"Of course not. I chased you around the world for two years. I'd just rather you did it immediately. If I wanted to dawdle, I’d do it the tried and true S.H.I.E.L.D. way."

"Will do, Agent Hill." Natasha’s wry smile is surprisingly friendly.

"I'll see you soon, Miss Romanov. By the way, I'm really glad you're not dead." Maria offers, because it’s true - she really is happy about that.

"Thank you. One more thing, Agent Hill?"

"Yes?"

Natasha slides a small scrap of paper across to Maria Hill, a GPS tracker’s frequency and an encryption key scrawled on it, which appears to be RHODODENDRON.  

"S.H.I.E.L.D. doesn’t use trackers in that range  - oh, are you shitting me, Romanov?" Maria swears, as she realizes what Natasha is communicating. Natasha Romanov, bless your twitchy, distrustful, heart, and thank you for placing a bug on my best friend, she thinks.

“I placed it as a precaution, but I never tracked it. Out of respect for Clint.” Natasha admits.

Maria looks at her watch. "Thank you for your paranoia, but you now only have thirteen minutes, which I suspect is still at least five more minutes than you need," Maria nods her farewell as she opens the heavy metal door, now unlocked, stepping outside briskly.

"Go get 'em, Agent Hill." Natasha says, granting Maria Hill a sharp salute.

***

In the vents, Clint and Natasha find their confiscated weapons, sorted neatly into plain black backpacks, an unmarked S.H.I.E.L.D. credit card which they’re most certainly not going to use, and the address for a small airfield, which makes Maria Hill’s intentions as clear as day. The last vent they drop out of rattles with the sounds of subway trains, and they quickly find a service door that leads to a convenient subway tunnel. They make their way back to Arachnoflora, because Natasha stashes the rest of her weapons cache there.

When they arrive at their little flower shop, Kate Bishop is waiting for them with a duffle bag, and her purple bow and quiver over her shoulder.

“Katie, what are you doing?” Clint asks, because Kate does not currently look like a girl who’s come in to open the shop. “The shop’s closed, you don’t need to come in.”

“I suspect that the internship she wanted wasn’t really in flower arranging, Clint.” Natasha says patiently, sizing up Kate’s weapon and clothing choices approvingly before she proceeds to the back room to quickly load up the rest of her gear.

“Jesus, does _everyone_ know I’m Hawkeye now?” Clint sighs under his breath.

“No, just me. I figured it out. And I’m coming with you guys.” Kate has a determined look on her face that Clint recognizes, sympathizes with even, but - no.

“Yeah, that’s not happening.” Clint says. Because, nope, absolutely not.

“But - “

“No buts.” Clint’s voice is as authoritative as he can make it. When has his life become this? He’s trying to be a _florist_. Not an assassin, or an precocious assassin’s babysitter.

“Seriously, I can handle myself.” Kate insists, her face determined.

“I believe you, kid.” Natasha says, and Clint startles a little, because Natasha sounds like she’s actually ramping up to negotiate with a nineteen year old girl. “But, this is not the time to prove it. When we get back, we’ll talk about making this internship of yours a little more...expansive.”

“You are not training her. No, definitely not. Absolutely not.” Clint says, but the two women are no longer paying attention to him.

“Really, Miss Romanov?” Kate says, bouncing up and down on her toes, her hands clasped in adoration. “Oh man, I think you guys are amazing. I knew you weren’t really dead. I knew it!”

“I don’t know how long we’ll be gone. I had planned on closing the store but, if you want -“

“Yes! I can run the store! Totally. I’m great at stores.”

“Congratulations, you’re hired, with pay. I’ve already diverted all our pending orders to other florists. Can you handle the restocks and walk-in orders?” Natasha says.

“And afterwards?” Kate asks, her eyes excited and pleading.

“I’ll call you when we get back, and you’ll show up for your internship in comfortable shoes.”  

“Yes, ma’am! Will do!” Kate salutes to them and cheerily hops behind the counter as Natasha and Clint leave the store. Clint starts to open his mouth in protest, but Natasha is already speeding down the street, and it’s all he can do to throw his arms around her and try not to fall off the bike as she makes a sharp turn.

At the airfield, Maria Hill is waiting, leaning against the unmarked helicopter with a worried look on her face, although it eases up when she sees them. She is dressed casually in jeans and a dark grey hoodie, although he notes the bulk of light Kevlar and her sidearm under her clothing.   

“Maria.” Clint says, trying to find some sort of further news about Phil written on her face. “Um, Agent Hill, I suppose.”

“Barton. Sorry, I’d call you Clint, but it’s a little weird now that you’re not...y’know, doing the florist thing.” Maria apologizes.

“Just you?” Natasha tosses her bags into the helicopter.

“My fiance volunteered as well, after he came to. Thanks for not injuring him, by the way. But since I’ll probably be fired for this stunt, one of us needs to keep a job. S.H.I.E.L.D.’s health insurance plan is fantastic.” Maria hops into the helicopter and offers Natasha a hand up, which she doesn’t need but takes anyway. Clint clambers in after them.

“So, was it North Carolina or South Carolina?” Natasha asks.

“North Carolina, most likely. It is no longer moving." Maria climbs into the pilot’s seat, her voice catching when she says that it’s possible that Phil Coulson may no longer be alive. “Thanks again for being paranoid, Miss Romanov.”

"I placed it in his shoe, so it doesn't mean _he_ 's no longer moving."

“Wait, what the hell, Tasha? You planted a tracker on Phil?” Clint grumbles, secretly grateful.

“Can we argue about this later?” Maria chimes in, lifting the helicopter off the ground with ease. “Miss Romanov, it would be grand if you could co pilot.”

As the helicopter rises above the tarmac, and the low hum of instruments settles over the cabin, Clint leans back in his seat, the exhaustion of the past day finally catching up with his weary body. He thinks of the Phil Coulson that cleaned out his bucket of vomit and cuddled him while he drunkenly slurred out his feelings. The Phil Coulson with the clever eyes, and the wry humour, and the slightly awkward way of ducking his head when he’s feeling nervous. He wants to hope, he does. He wants to trust. But, still, Clint can’t help but wonder if that Phil Coulson was ever real, and wonders who exactly is it that they’re out to rescue.


	11. Chapter 11

Maria Hill is leaning up behind a pickup truck that she does not own, but she found it in a parking lot at a campground, so it’s likely the owner won’t come looking for it for a couple days yet. She is parked in the middle of a lush forest, heavy and dense only a hundred feet from an abandoned gravel road. The building that they are observing is a boring, concrete block of a 7-Eleven incongruously set against the backdrop of the Appalachians. It looks like a perfectly ordinary 7-Eleven, except for the fact that no one builds chain convenience stores in the deep forest boonies of North Carolina, and judging by the lack of customers, no one visits it either. As far as fronts go, it’s not the worst one she’s ever seen. That award still goes to the laundromat located in the nudist colony in Sao Paulo. Inside the convenience store, a teenage boy looks bored at the counter.

“I have good news and bad news.” Natasha says, appearing beside her suddenly, dressed in a sleek black catsuit she seems to have spirited out of nowhere. She shoves the communicator that Maria had lent her back into her ear, and drops a tablet back into Maria’s lap. Maria scrolls past the camera feeds now on screen, hoping to catch a glimpse of Phil Coulson.

“Bad news first.” Maria requests. If Phil’s dead, then she doesn’t need the good news, because she’ll be ordering an airstrike on the HYDRA-base-disguised-as-a-7-Eleven within minutes.

“The bad news is that there are ten underground levels, and two hundred combatants underneath that convenience store. And about a hundred civilians, who seem like mostly scientists and technicians held under duress. That means I can't just go in guns blazing, and we can't just blow the place up, due to the civilians and the fact that the explosion will likely cause a landslide on the other side of the mountain.”

“You have actually have enough ordnance to blow the place up? On you?”

Natasha shrugs. “Not really, but I wanted to assure you it wasn’t an option anyway. I also hacked their cameras. The good news is that your Phil Coulson is alive, and they seem intent on getting information out of him, not in killing him, so I suspect that if he holds out, he'll live long enough for you to call S.H.I.E.L.D. in.”

“It'll probably take S.H.I.E.L.D. at least five hours to get a full team out to handle a base of this size. They'll have to call in agents from other field ops for offensive infiltration, as well as as civilian evac.”

“He'll last that long. You S.H.I.E.L.D. agents are pretty hardy.” There is definitely a note of respect in Natasha’s voice, and it makes Maria grin despite her worry.

“You think it's a suicide mission for us to go in?” Maria asks.

“I do.” Natasha agrees easily.

“Are you suggesting we do it anyway?”

“Of course not. Why would I do that? That would be rash, and irrational.”

“Huh.” Maria says, running her hand through her short hair. ”Somehow, I'd expected you to be more...fiery.”

“It's part of the reputation.” Natasha laughs. “I take calculated risks, not suicide missions.”

“I suppose have to trust you then.” Maria considers, and the notion does not terrify her as much as she thought it would. “Has anyone ever trusted you?”

Natasha looks sad, her eyes downcast. An unreadable look flashes across her face. “No one should trust me.” she says, and in that moment, Natasha Romanov looks younger and more lost than anyone would expect the the Black Widow to be, and that notion slams hard into Maria’s chest.  

“I didn't ask whether anyone should. I asked whether anyone has.” Maria clarifies, her hand automatically reaching out to rest on Natasha’s. Natasha does not jerk it away.

Maria watches as Natasha’s eyes drift to the tree, a hundred feet away, where they know Clint Barton is, steady and silent. “Just one, I think.” Natasha says.

Maria swallows, feeding a little dizzy. “You can make that two.” she whispers, and suddenly, Natasha is closer than she’d expected her to be. The scent of Natasha’s hair, tinged with honey and gunpowder, fills her lungs, and then Natasha is looking at her, her eyes wide and dark. Her lips are only inches away from Maria’s own, and there’s nothing Maria wants to do more in this moment than reassure Natasha Romanov that she is worth trusting. She also really, really, wants to kiss her. And the look in Natasha’s eyes - well, they both appear to be on the same page.

Natasha licks her lips.

“This is a really bad idea, because i'm getting married in one week.” Maria says, regretfully.

Her final word is punctuated by an arrow flying past her head. The arrow lodges in a wild boar a hundred feet away, which squeals and falls over, still in his charging position. His long tusks are threatening and sharp and already streaked with blood, hopefully from another animal.

“Shit.” Maria curses, shaking the dazed feeling from her head. “We missed that. We can't get distracted, Romanov.”

"Where's Clint? Clint?” Natasha whispers into her comm unit, her brow furrowing in worry. “He's not answering."

"He’s just maintaining radio silence. Up in his perch. Looking out for us. By shooting that stupid animal while we were stupidly making eyes at each other." Maria Hill runs a hand through her hair, frustrated. Natasha is still glaring at the arrow embedded in the large animal.  

"Agent Hill, look.” Natasha points at the animal. ”Clint is obnoxiously showy sometimes. But, even he doesn't use arrows with bright purple fletching." Natasha explains, patiently.

“What?” Agent Hill says. There is more than one person with ridiculously precise aim using a paleolithic weapon within a three hundred foot radius of their current position?

"Call S.H.I.E.L.D. in.” Natasha commands. “I have to go haul a nineteen year old prodigal brat of an archer out of a tree."

***

Clint awakes in a drowsy haze. His mouth is dry and tastes like motor oil and dirty cotton - which is easily explained by the dirty gag made out of an old bandanna stuffed in his mouth. His hands are bound as well. The room is lit by a single flickering light bulb dangling from the ceiling; the concrete floor is cold and damp. In the corner is a bucket that smells like piss. The door is heavy and metal, and doesn’t have a visible lock, not that he has access to his lockpicks now anyway.

Oh boy, he feels stupid. He’d heard a rustling in the woods, and instead of just looking in that direction, like a sniper who’s famous for his incredibly good eyesight would do, he’d gotten down from his perch, approached it, and promptly fell into a pit. A very...deep pit. When he woke, he was - well, he’s now here. In a room. Feeling very stupid.

There is a tapping on the wall next to him, irritating and persistent. Clint groans, ignores it, and drifts back into an empty sleep.

***

“Kate Bishop?” Maria says, sizing up the young girl scowling in front of her. The girl is dressed in jeans, a purple tanktop and a black hoodie, her hands sulkily shoved in her pockets, and there’s no mistaking the purple bow she has slung over her shoulder as a toy.

“You know her?” Natasha groans, rubbing her forehead with one hand.

“Let’s just say I’ve been spending some time in the past few years keeping an eye on people with preternatural aim.” Maria concedes.

“I’m sorry, I just thought you guys could use some help. Which you obviously need, since you were too busy looking at each other to notice the _giant probably mutant wild boar with the pointy tusks_.” Kate rolls her eyes.

“Oh, shut up.” Maria says, but she bumps her shoulder up against Kate’s, and nudges her a silent _thank you_.

“We have to go in. They have Clint. They’re not trying to kill Phil, but they probably won’t hold back on Clint.” Natasha says, already digging through her duffle bag. “Hopefully, they’ll think he was working alone, or just stupid, which considering his recent behaviour, is entirely possible.”

“You just said that going in there was was a suicide mission.” Maria points out, although she is already gathering up her weapons.

“Yes. But now we have _two_ people on the inside, at least once we rescue them. And an extra one out here to cover our backs. Maria, I hope the infiltration and espionage training at S.H.I.E.L.D is up to par.”

In response, Maria checks her guns and raises an eyebrow at Natasha. Oh, she’s up to par.

“No guns.” Natasha says, shaking her head. “There are metal detectors everywhere in the building, we’ll set off the alarms within seconds. We can find weapons once we get in, those are encoded to the security system.”

Maria puts down her guns. Seriously? “Alright, so what are you suggesting? There’s only one way in, and it’s definitely through the front door of that 7-Eleven.”

Natasha grins, pulling out a red apron, and a tiny black dress that seems far too small for anyone. She hands a tube of red lipstick, to Maria. By her feet, is an old mason jar, probably filled with moonshine at some point in its tragic glass receptacle life. Natasha picks it up, brushes the dirt off, and nods approvingly at it.  “Miss Bishop, for your first official training mission, I need you to go pick some wildflowers and berries.”

Five minutes later, Maria is hobbling down the gravel path in a dress that she hopes to god never sees the light of day again, crimson lipstick brightly smeared on her lips. Natasha is casually striding next to her, a red Arachnoflora apron tied around her waist, her hands delicately balancing a gorgeous bouquet of wildflowers in an old mason jar.

“Hello?” the pockmarked cashier starts, obviously surprised to see people in his store, much less two stunningly gorgeous women.

“Hi! I’m Natalie, from Arachnoflora! We have a delivery for…” she squints at his name tag “...Tommy. Are you Tommy?”

“Um, yes? But -” The young boy stammers.

“Someone sent you flowers!” Natasha gestures to Maria, grinning. “And a Song-A-Gram! I’ll need you to sign right here...” She looks down and taps on the tablet, but doesn’t actually hand it over.

“I’m - I’m pretty sure no one sent me flowers.” Tommy stutters, but his eyes are focused entirely on Maria and her very tight dress.

“Are you sure? My friend here is a wonderful Song-A-Gram. Just sit there, and watch.”

Maria tries to bury a sigh as she wiggles over to the counter. “Happy birthday to youuuuu.” she drawls.

“It’s not - not my - “ Tommy starts to say, but is immediately cut off by Maria Hill hopping on top of the the counter, whipping her long legs around to straddle his waist.

“Happy birthday to youuuu.” Maria sings, and she knows that her singing voice is not anything to write home about, but in this stupid dress, she suspects that her ability to carry a tune is hardly the point. Tommy, the 7-Eleven cashier, stares at her, his mouth agape.

“Happy birthday to you, dear Tooooommmmy.” Maria manages to trill out, ignoring the way her voice can barely hit the notes, and Tommy’s eyes roll back into his head, a tranquilizer dart - really, Kate, you have purple fletching on these too? - embedded in his neck.

“Happy birthday, and good riddance.” Maria growls, stepping down behind the counter, and yanking the hem of her dress down as far as it will go, which is not very far at all. “Please tell me that you got everything done, Ms. Romanov, because that was by far, the most embarrassing thing I’ve ever done, and I once went undercover as a football mascot in a giant squirrel suit.”

Maria repositions Tommy on the stool behind the counter, yanking the dart out and rearranging him into an accidentally-asleep-at-work position. When he wakes up, he’ll have a headache, and some memory loss, and probably be unemployed, but he’ll live.

“Everything’s perfect. I just needed a distraction. All external cameras will now be playing a prerecorded loop for thirty minutes. Any more will be suspicious, but that should be plenty of time for us to get in.” Natasha says, already unlooping a long strand of plastic covered wire from the impromptu wildflower arrangement and handing it over. “We can take the service elevator down, as long as we get into the vents before the elevator doors open.”

Maria takes a deep breath. Okay, she’s about to infiltrate a HYDRA base with the Black Widow, completely unarmed except for a spool of floral wire. Natasha is quickly pacing the store, grabbing items off shelves and placing them on the counter. Oh, and a can of wasp spray. And...a bag of Flaming Hot Cheetos. And a box of condoms. And tampons. Maria looks at Natasha, who is already secreting the shoplifted items onto her person. Natasha shrugs, places a hundred dollar bill under Tommy’s limp arm, and hands Maria several miniature bottles of wine, and a lighter.

“I have your pants, Agent Hill!” Kate’s chirpy voice says, from right outside the door, and that is the best sentence that Maria Hill has heard all day.


	12. Chapter 12

Clint wakes up to the same tapping sound as before, annoying and persistent and arrhythmic. Jesus, he thinks, at least tap something useful, like a pleasant drumbeat, or a happy tune, or Morse - wait. Clint listens to the tapping more. It might be a modified Morse, with two taps to signify a dash, and he tries to translate the taps.

The taps do translate easily into corresponding Morse letters, and Clint starts to line up the letters up in his head, thanking Natasha for making him learn and practice the code for years.

S-P-E-R-M-A-R-I-A. The first phrase is awkward, and Clint doubts that that means anything. What’s a sperm aria anyway? Although, the thought of tiny operatic sperm makes him chuckle, so at least that’s something.

Clint tunes in again to translate another short phrase

L-I-N-T. Alright, also not useful. What’s will be next - will the dude need a quarter for laundry after cleaning out the super secret HYDRA basement laundromat dryer lint trap?

I-A-M-A-R-C-U-S. I am Arcus? Okay, there is a person on the other end of the wall, named Arcus? That’s a stupid name.

The tapping continues, and Clint tries to focus further, because it’s at least something to do with his time, even if the person is apparently just going to ramble nonsensically in Morse.

J-A-S-P-E-R-M-A-R-I-A-C-L-I-N-T-M-A-R-C-U-S. Ah, that’s better. Utter gibberish now, Clint thinks, before he realizes what the phrase is. _Names_. One of them is his. Another two, he knows.

Clint rolls himself over to the wall, not a little bit frantically. P-H-I-L, he taps out, following the same dash substitution as the man on the other side.

The tapping stops abruptly. W-H-O, it asks.

C-L-I-N-T, Clint responds, stretching to try to actually hit the wall with some measure of force,  wishing that he wasn’t gagged, or trussed up like a spring chicken.

W-T-F, Phil taps. R-U-O-K.

Y. Clint answers, because he’s probably a bit more tied up that Phil is, based on the volume of Phil’s tapping, and trying to tap a snarky “well, I’ve been better!” (B-E-E-N-B-T-R) would take too much effort. He is relieved though - Phil is alive, Phil is here, Phil will be okay, for now. And he can’t help but smile a little though the gag, knowing that somehow, he’s made it to the short list of people that Phil would think about in captivity.

 

***

Maria marches down the hallway on the ninth basement level of the - awful, godforsaken, surprisingly well lit, she thinks - HYDRA base, Natasha by her side. They’ve made it through nine floors without attracting undue attention, although Natasha had to tactically divert a junior scientist who was tailing them.

“Are you new?” he’d said, ”Do you want to grab a coffee?”

“No, I’m not new.” Natasha had replied. “You have balls, kid. And I will dip them in Flaming Hot Cheeto dust if you continue to follow me.”

The junior scientist took a left turn at the next opportunity.

They’re both dressed in lab coats, which Natasha had handily requisitioned from the supply room thanks to a 10’ length of floral wire(a good garrote, apparently) and a can of wasp spray(a reasonable substitute for mace). Maria is partial to - well, much less lethal means - but they have key cards now, and HYDRA is HYDRA, and no one really likes them anyway.

“Jesus, Agent Hill, you look like you’ve never seen improvised weaponry before.” Natasha laughs, popping the cap back on her wasp spray.  

“I have. Phil Coulson teaches the class at S.H.I.E.L.D.” Maria has sat in the class twice, and Phil is a wonder to watch, but she’s also pretty certain Phil has never threatened anyone with Cheeto-dust before.

“A friendly challenge then. You pull out the next one.” Natasha says, a bit mockingly.

“Fine.” Maria snipes back. The Black Widow may have her own set of tactics, but she is Agent Maria Hill of S.H.I.E.L.D., she is a fully trained and qualified field agent, and she has her ways of getting what she wants.

They seem to be generally ignored, having made their way through the R and D floors with ease in their current disguise. But their building plans are indicating that they’re about to arrive at the most likely level where Phil is kept, and it is certainly not a well lit series of science labs. They come to the end of the corridor, no longer quite as populated as the other levels, and there is a door with a large and burly armed guard posted right in front of it.

Maria reaches into the bag, and pulls out a packet of tampons.

“I was saving those for later.” Natasha whispers. ”If you dip them in the wine and light them on fire-”

Maria scowls, and steps up to the guard.

“I’m sorry, ma’am, this area is restricted.”

“IS THAT RIGHT, SOLDIER?” Maria bellows, and the guard jumps back, a bit alarmed. “Do you know what this is?” She waves the tampon packet in his face. “I am bleeding like a stuck pig out of my lady parts, and I need to use the bathroom behind that door, because it’s my special bathroom for my special time of month.”

The guard's eyes twitch towards the long narrow wrapper in her hands, and shudders, as if it were radioactive. He points at Natasha quizically, although he is already starting to tremble.

“Oh my god, you moron! Women always go to the bathroom together, and I will rip your balls off and bleed on them if you don’t let me shove this wad of cotton into my vagina _RIGHT THE FUCK NOW_!” 

Maria pokes the guard in his bulky body armour with the edge of the tampon packet, and the guard cringes away.

“Yes, ma’am. Please proceed, ma’am.” the guard stutters, hastily shuffling aside to let them in.

 

***

Phil is relieved, happy, angry, and panicked, all at the same time, which is a difficult set of emotions to express while tied up and gagged on the damp concrete floor of a HYDRA cell. On one hand, Clint is here, and on the other hand, Clint is _here_.

Phil sighs. He'd been biding his time, waiting for the S.H.I.E.L.D. extraction. So far, the questioning has been light, and the attempted torture amateurish, and Phil had estimated being able to hold out for at least another week, which was plenty of time for Maria to find and retrieve him. But then, knowing that Clint is in the neighbouring cell really makes him reevaluate the mission objectives. He sighs, as he begins to dislocate his thumbs.

The door slams open then, followed by a guard, who might be either angry or constipated. He's holding a syringe, which promptly gets jabbed into Phil's side. Ah yes, of course, Phil thinks. Sodium thiopenthal, more commonly known as sodium pentothal, or one of the many chemical formulations presumed to be a “truth serum”. It’s not entirely true of course - it’s just a fast acting barbiturate general anesthetic that decreases higher cognitive function, which lying is. For most people, and Phil is not most people. So it’s not necessarily a truth serum, more of a slightly-reduced-defenses-serum, but Phil’s defenses are very high to start with.

"Who is this?" the guard asks, gesturing towards the door as Clint is thrown unceremoniously to the floor by another guard, who steps back out and locks the door behind them.

His gag is yanked off roughly, and Phil takes the chance to take several big gulps of air, untinged by the flavour of motor oil. "He's my florist." Truth. He’ll give them one partial, incomplete truth.

“What is he doing here?”

“I don’t actually know.” Okay, another truth. HYDRA must be really slipping if this is how their interrogations go now.

Clint’s gag is removed. The guard turns to him. “What are you doing here?”

“I came to save that man, over there on the floor, who...whom?...who?...well, that man over there, that I have a massive crush on.” Clint says. Clint is not very well trained in interrogation resistance techniques, Phil thinks. 

“Who are you?” The guard continues, obviously flummoxed.

“I dunno, man. I’m just a dude. I like flowers and shit.” Clint grins brightly and ugh, he looks so sweet, and trusting and innocent, which Phil knows is absolutely not true.

The guard actually sighs, and Phil would feel sorry for him, if he weren’t - well, if he weren’t a HYDRA guard. “Who are you in relation to this S.H.I.E.L.D agent?” The guard tries again, gesturing in Phil’s direction.

“I’m his florist? We were dating and then we broke up because he was stupid and i was stupid, and then I was sad, but I still like him. I dunno, Phil, do you still like me?” Clint turns his wide eyes in Phil’s direction, and out of all things to do in a basement HYDRA jail cell - he _pouts_.

Jesus, Phil thinks. This is the worst time in the world to have a relationship conversation. He says that, which is also a truth, because it is honestly difficult to imagine a worse time to have “the talk” than one accompanied with an armed guard and a decent dose of barbiturates.

“I did not sign up to be a relationship counselor,” the guard groans. “I’m really not paid enough for this. But you two are kinda cute, so please answer him or I’ll stab you again.”

And Phil is trained to resist interrogation, he is trained to resist days and weeks of torture, he is trained to lie on polygraph tests, maintain his composure under the influence of drugs - but Clint is staring at him with the most openly adoring expression on his face and he is most certainly not trained to resist _that_.

“Yeah, I like you. And I’d like to take you out on a real date when we get back to New York.” Phil admits. Truth, again. He must be slipping. Well, you don’t often get the kiss-and-make-up-session that you want, Phil thinks, but you certainly get the one you deserve.  

“Oh. That’s great.” Clint smiles congenially, before passing out in a heap on the floor.

“That’s adorable. I hope you understand that neither of you will be returning to New York, but for what it’s worth, under other circumstances, I’d be rooting for you.” The guard nods to Phil, and begins to drag Clint out of the door.

Fortunately, Phil has finished dislocating this thumbs, and it only takes him 48 seconds to disarm and subdue the guard. He does so non-lethally, because amongst other things, he’s had worse relationship counselors. S.H.I.E.L.D agents are often extremely underestimated, he thinks, right before the drugs take hold to full effect, and he falls asleep.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1\. For what it's worth, I write the truth serum scene BEFORE Ep 1 of Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D, so it's a slightly more realistic take on how it really works.


	13. Chapter 13

Clint wakes up to the sound of Natasha Romanov’s laughter, and with his head on something very comfortable, and startles awake to find out that it is Phil’s torso. Phil’s very nice, firm, very perfect torso, still encased in a slightly dirty, but otherwise still gorgeous suit. He’s no longer tied up, and it’s purely instinct to slump back down onto Phil, who appears to still be sleeping. Phil is warm. Phil is nice. Phil is...oh god, exactly how much time in captivity has he spent making pouty faces at Phil?

“I hope you two managed to make up before we got here, otherwise we’d have to awkwardly explain why we arranged you in that position.” Natasha points out, where she is sitting crosslegged on the other side of the room. She looks a lot more comfortable than she should, considering the current situation.

“We’re not being weird. I just figured at least one of you should be comfortable, and Phil will sleep through anything, drugged or not.” Maria adds, from her spot by Natasha. They appear to be playing cards.

Clint groans and hauls himself up to a sitting position. “Did you two get captured too?” he asks, because that would really suck. Although, he’d probably be teased for getting his ass captured by HYDRA for months, so maybe having some leverage against Natasha wouldn’t be that bad.

“Nope.” Maria says, relaxed and happy. “Of course not. Romanov, do you have any threes?”

“Go fish.” Natasha waves her cards in the direction of the deck of cards sitting in between them.

“Romanov’s intel was bad.” Maria explains, with a light snort. She picks a card up from the deck and narrows her eyes at the cards in her hand.

“Hill’s intel was non existent.” Natasha raises an eyebrow at Maria, although it isn’t a particularly antagonistic eyebrow. “Also the guard at the door finally realized that there aren’t any bathrooms on this level. Which is really too bad, because I have to pee.”

Maria sighs, tossing her cards down in a pile. ”Basically, HYDRA has been renting out space in their underground facility, because apparently the economy downturn also affects evil organizations of evil. So, floors three through eight are perfectly legitimate science research facilities, except for floor five, where they test makeup on bunnies, and it’s really gross.”

“Floors nine and ten are definitely HYDRA though, and once we tripped the alarms on the way to come get you, about two hundred guards started to converge on our position. That was not very fun.” Natasha adds. “Wait, no, who am I kidding. That was awesome.”

“You took out two hundred guards?” Clint is skeptical - Natasha is a close combat expert, but two hundred is a very high number, not that Natasha tends to keep count in the heat of battle.

Maria laughs, shaking her head. “Of course not. We took out fifteen. And then we locked ourselves in, because climbing out of an elevator shaft lugging 400 pounds of dead weight pursued by approximately one hundred and eighty five HYDRA agents seemed like a very bad idea.”

“On the bright side, the civilians have self evacuated, and we have all of level ten to ourselves until the rest of S.H.I.E.L.D. gets here, or HYDRA figures out how to override our locks.” Natasha points out, but the clanging coming from down the hall suggests that the latter at least seems very unlikely.

Clint groans, his joints still sore from being trussed up like an unwieldy lobster, and shuffles Phil’s unconscious body into his lap. At least it’s more comfortable that the damp floor, he thinks. Phil snuffles a little, a small, low, happy sound that makes Clint a little jealous. He never gets the happy dreams while he’s drugged. He can’t help it, he leans down and plants a soft kiss on Phil’s forehead. Natasha and Maria start shuffling their cards again, and look at him quizzically.

“We also have Flaming Hot Cheetos and wine.” Maria Hill says, rummaging through Natasha’s backpack.

Well, he’s had worse days. "Okay, fine, deal me into this round."

***

Phil Coulson drifts awake to a hand carding through his hair, and it feels amazing. He wants to open his eyes, but he’s leaning on a pair of strong thighs that he can recognize by feel alone, and he does not want to move from his very comfortable spot on what is presumably Clint Barton’s thighs, so he squeezes his eyes closed. Also, he has a headache, and it hurts, as headaches tend to.

But Maria Hill is giggling, and his head feels inexplicably damp and sticky and a little bit warm, so he jolts upwards, and finds himself covered in a small pile of soggy Flaming Hot Cheetos.

“Hi, Phil.” Maria pats his shoulder cautiously..

“Hi, Phil.” Clint says, sheepishly.

“They got tired of playing cards, so we were competing to see how many Cheetos we could stick to your bald spot.” Natasha explains, unrepentantly. “I’m winning. Seven, so far.”

Phil brushes the yellow dust off his head, ignoring the snickering. He rubs his temples and loosens his tie, ignoring the way his neck cracks as he moves.

“Is this a rescue mission? Because this sure as hell does not look like a rescue mission.” He knows he sounds a little more irritable than he’d intended. Clint slips a strong hand into his and tugs him away to the other side of the small cell, and he follows. Even if it’s really only eight feet away, and Maria and Natasha are not even pretending not to eavesdrop.

“Okay, let’s not make this difficult.” Clint starts, pressing two small pills and a miniature wine bottle into his hand. “First, take some Advil. You can dry swallow or wash it down with this awful Pink Zinfandel.”

“I didn’t even know that Zinfandels came in pink.” Phil grumbles, but he takes the medicine, and washes it down with a large gulp of wine. The wine is expectedly awful, but it does make him feel a little bit better. Clint smiles, a little bit tired, but still very good looking, and Phil really hopes that there is some sort of easy forgiveness there, because he really cannot deal with more dramatic declarations of adoration in his life.

“Aren’t you supposed to be classy and know about wine?” Clint teases.

“This is pink wine out of a miniature plastic bottle.” Phil groans. He downs the rest of the bottle. It is still awful. And pink.

Phil looks down. Clint is still holding his hand. Clint fidgets and clears his throat.

“I don’t want this to be weird, so I’m just going to tell you that I’m really into you, and S.H.I.E.L.D. recruitment or not, I’d really like to see if this thing with you can go somewhere.” Clint says, and he looks so tragically hopeful that it makes Phil laugh. 

Phil smiles a relieved smile. He been prepared for a more complicated conversation, but he won’t object to the softball being tossed lightly in his direction. “Yeah, I like you too, dumbass.” he mutters, and even though it is quite difficult to ignore Natasha and Maria’s hollering from only eight feet away, he pulls Clint into an absolutely indecent kiss.

“Wow, your best friend has a really long tongue.” Natasha says.

“Ew.” Maria says.

***

The door of the cell explodes open, covering the place in fine dust, which soon clears to reveal Nick Fury, Jasper Sitwell, and a small contingent of agents dressed in field black. Sitwell looks a little bit more rumpled than normal, having apparently lost his suit jacket. It’s too bad he’s not in his field gear, Maria thinks, his butt looks great in his field suit. Fury looks crankier than normal, and his eyepatch appears to be slightly twitchier.  “Level Ten is clear.” Director Fury shouts down the hall. “Get whatever information you can, and let’s get our asses out of here.”

Fury and Sitwell turn their eyes back to the four people in the room, and neither of them look particularly pleased.

They may not be looking particularly pleased because the scene in front of them consists of the following - Clint Barton and Natasha Romanov, world class assassins, recent S.H.I.E.L.D. recruits, and recent S.H.I.E.L.D. escapees. Agent Maria Hill, field agent about to be written up for insubordination, improper use of S.H.I.E.L.D credentials, and unauthorized execution of a field mission.

And Phil Coulson, who is currently bare ass naked.

“I should probably put pants on.” Phil mutters. “Your timing could have been better, Marcus.”

Clint Barton(shirtless and shoeless) drops his jacket in Phil’s naked lap, in a surprisingly gentlemanly gesture. Nick Fury frowns in the direction of Phil Coulson's asscrack, before rapidly averting his eye. 

“I apologize, Director Fury,” Maria Hill says, her voice a little bit slurred. The bottle of miniature wine in her hand provides an obvious explanation as to why. She giggles, resting her head on Natasha Romanov’s fully dressed shoulder. “However, Agent Coulson is fucking awful at strip poker.”


	14. Chapter 14

“So.” Phil Coulson says, as Maria Hill slips into his office, closing his door quietly behind her.

“So.” Maria Hill sinks exhaustedly into his plush couch.

“Well, my ‘get glared at by Nick Fury’ session is scheduled for half an hour from now, so I still have some time to listen to you tell me how terrifying it was. At least you didn’t get your ass kidnapped. Or naked.” Phil says. Why did he ever agree to play strip poker while trapped in a cell with three of the deadliest people he’s ever met?

“Well.” Maria says.

“Is there a reason you’re communicating in monosyllables?” Phil stands up, shifting his pile of forms aside to join Maria on the couch.

Maria sinks her face into her hands and groans. “I’mgonnabeassistantdirector,” she mumbles.

Phil laughs. He reaches over for his bottom drawer, where he keeps the bottle of scotch. Maria takes her first shot gratefully, her second very quickly, and manages to pause before the third. It’s not a particularly good bottle of scotch, and does not call for dignified sipping.

“Apparently, my stunt with Hawkeye and Black Widow was what convinced Fury. He said the only issue with me beforehand was that I might be _too_ loyal - he needed someone who could call him out if he was wrong.” Maria explains.

Of course, the one time Maria Hill disobeys orders, and she gets promoted. “When do you start?” Phil asks.

“Well, I’m leading the mission to hunt down the last of the rogue HYDRA elements that were out to kill you. Oh, good news on that, by the way, not all of HYDRA was out for you, just a small breakaway faction? It’s complicated. Anyway, I expect it’ll take a couple months. I leave in five days.”

“Wow, congratulations.” Phil says, before he considers the timing. “You’ll be heading out right after your wedding?”

“About that.” Maria says, rubbing her temples, although it might just be the sudden input of scotch into her system. “Jasper and I...talked. And I think we’ve been - really rushing things, you know? I mean, you were shocked when I told you, and nothing shocks you. I was just so worried that I’d never get my special wedding day that I just wanted to get married, and it didn’t matter who exactly it was I was marrying. I love him, I do, but we still have lots of things we need to work out, and I think we’re going to dial it all back a little bit and just try dating like normal people for a while.”

Phil shrugs. He’d been a good friend, and he can’t fault Maria for her enthusiasm, but frankly, he’s quite happy about not having to help organize a legion of caterers and table centerpieces.

“I hate to be practical, but isn’t it too late to get your venue deposit back?” he asks.

“It is.” Maria sighs. “Natasha was happy to cancel the flower order, though. Trust me, my mom’s pretty pissed.”

“Hmm, is it Natasha now, and not Miss Romanov?” Phil raises an quizzical eyebrow, but he doesn’t expect that he’ll get much of an answer out of Maria. There had been enough meaningful stares between Maria and Natasha and Jasper on the quinjet ride out of North Carolina, although he hadn’t paid much attention because Clint had spent the same amount of time sleeping on his shoulder, and he was far too busy relishing the sensation of being forgiven by a very good looking man.

“We’ll talk about that when I get back. Take care, Phil. Good luck with Fury.” Maria grins, downs her third shot of scotch with only a mild, slightly spluttery, cough afterwards, and saunters out of Phil’s office.

 

***

“Are you sure about this?” Clint asks. He is behind the counter at Arachnoflora, where it feels right, like something good and stable and normal. Kate is in the backroom taking an inventory of their earthenware pots, although he knows that the moment the clock hits noon, she’ll be taking a lunch break to set up targets to shoot at in the alley, and she’ll be hollering for him to come join her.

Natasha is dressed in black, and looks much more like a spy than a florist. “Yeah, I’m sure.” She wanders around the small shop, pausing to poke at the leaves of a healthy fern. “I met someone that convinced me that even large faceless organizations can care about people. On an individual level.”

“Tash, you’re not fooling anyone. I know you’re talking about Maria Hill.” Clint groans, tossing a bunch of lilacs into a vase. His motions are careless, but the flowers are an exuberant mess, and look wonderful anyway. He’s good at this, he knows, he’s good at flowers and leaves and making them look amazing in effortless arrangements of colour and joy.

“And are you sure about this?” Natasha asks, nodding to the small flower shop. The morning deliveries have come in, and there are flowers in five gallon buckets of water, and stalk trimmings all over the floor, and Clint looks around at his little shop and yeah, he’s a good sniper too, but this little shop that smells like too many flowers and dirt - this is exactly where he wants to be.

Kate wanders in from the back room, places an inventory list in front of Clint, as well as three slightly damaged round pots. “These were cracked already. I bet they would make great clay pigeons.” she points out, lobbing one gently from hand to hand. Clint grins. Kate is perfect.

“Yep. I’m sure about this” Clint hands Natasha the vase of messy lilacs. “Please deliver these to Agent Maria Hill when you report in at S.H.I.E.L.D.; it's on the house. And say hi to Phil.”

Natasha smiles at him, and reaches out for a hug. “It’s not like I’m going away forever, dumbass. I’ll be back in a couple months.”

“Good luck, Agent Romanov.” Clint whispers into her hair.

 

***

It’s funny, Phil thinks, he’s much less nervous this time, stepping into Arachnoflora’s doorway. The bell, expectedly, dings his arrival, and doesn’t startle him.

Kate is behind the counter, and she looks up, curious - “Hey, Agent Coulson!”

She greets him brightly, and Phil is forced to reconcile the image of the bubbly teenager with the very serious sniper he’d had watching their backs as the entire S.H.I.E.L.D. rescue made their way out of the HYDRA compound. She’d done a fine job, impressing Maria, and even Director Fury, and Maria had already intimated that she certainly wouldn’t mind recruiting the girl, although she said she would wait until she could also legally buy Kate a drink for saving their asses. But now, she’s just Kate Bishop, Arachnoflora intern, and she’s glaring at him with a really obnoxiously smug look on her face.

“Clint’s gonna be pissed at you,” she says, teasing. “He saves your life, and you don’t call, you don’t write.”

“I was under protective custody.” Phil points out. He’d found himself whisked away immediately after his meeting with Nick Fury(it was appropriately terrifying), and placed in a suburban safehouse under armed guard. Of course, he was still expected to work, but aside from a quick note to Maria to let Clint know, he hadn’t had any ability to contact anyone, much less Clint. Fortunately, Maria had just called in her mission, after only three weeks instead of the predicted two months, and the moment he’d stepped off the tarmac, he’d made his way directly to Arachnoflora. “And technically, I think S.H.I.E.L.D. saved my life.”

“Agent Phil Coulson, what do you have to say for yourself?” Clint says, emerging out of the back room with a giant sunflower in his hands that he’s twirling like a baton. “I save your life, and you don’t call, you don’t write….”

“I just made that joke!” Kate gripes, but Clint is smiling happily, and it’s just too easy for take another step forward and let Clint draw him into his arms, which do happen to look particularly strong and muscled today, as does the rest of Clint.

“I got you a sunflower.” Clint says, leaning back only a little, and bopping Phil lightly on the back of his head with the ridiculously yellow flower.

“You already had the sunflower.” Phil takes the time to run his hands down Clint’s back, appreciating the slow curve right above his butt. He also appreciates Clint’s butt, and his wandering hands gladly continue their downward trajectory.

“Missed you.” Clint says, with a low hum in his voice that sends an electric thrill through Phil’s spine and he marvels at how Clint can still manage to have such an effect on him.

“Er, do you two want to get a room, or should I leave?” Kate interrupts, although she does have the decency to sound a little bit sheepish about it.

“Leave.” Clint grumbles, although Kate is already packing up her backpack, and easily disappearing through the back door.

It takes Clint approximately forty five seconds to flip the door sign to “CLOSED” and close all the blinds in the shop, and an additional thirty to get Phil into a horizontal position on the floor. Phil would be impressed at the efficiency, even though he’d generally prefer a surface less similar to hard concrete, and a bit less covered in moss bits. He doesn’t really care, because Clint has his head in a surprisingly tight hold, and his mouth is definitely set on making sure that Phil does not spend any more time thinking of whether the floor of Arachnoflora is an appropriately sanitary surface.

Clint stops for a second, looking down confused, his eyes raking over Phil’s entire body, which is still quite prone against the cold floor. “You’re not in a suit.” Clint says, gaping stupidly. Phil is in fact, not in a suit. He is in a white collared shirt, and a pair of dark jeans, and he really doesn’t think he looks too bad at all. “I’m suspended from duty for two weeks. The Director wants me to undergo additional training in evasion techniques before I’m cleared again. He’s pretty pissed that I got kidnapped.” Phil tries to explain. Director Fury is, in fact, still quite angry at him.

“I’m pretty pissed you got kidnapped too.” Clint says, not particularly interested in any sort of explanation.

“What, you don’t like me wearing jeans?” Phil teases, because the look on Clint’s face assures him that the man hovering hungrily atop him likes the pants just fine.

“Yeah, I’m not sure. Take them off so I can examine them further.” Clint tugs at Phil’s belt, and Phil is perfectly happy to obey that command.

They keep the flirting to a minimum afterwards, because Phil only manages to gets his pants pulled down about three inches, and Clint barely manages to get himself unzipped, before they’re both gasping words of no particular consequence into each other’s lips, rutting against each other like a pair of silly teenagers who have just discovered that friction feels very nice.

"Clint." Phil gasps. "I'm sorry, Phil is not really a name one screams during sex." 

"Oh fuck." Clint answers.

“Oh god.” Phil replies.

The rest of their conversation is similarly ineloquent.

Clint comes in Phil’s hand. Phil comes in his own pants. It's all a bit messy, and not particularly romantic, but Phil Coulson does not care, because there is no place that he'd rather be than lying on the cold concrete floor of a flower shop in Manhattan with Clint Barton.

They lie on the floor, waiting for their respective pulses to even out. Clint’s apparently reaches a baseline of normal first, because he manages to flop over to the counter for a roll of paper towels.

“So, since I’m out of work for a couple weeks, I thought maybe I could help you out at the store. Get to know you better, that sort of thing.” Phil starts.

“Get to know me better? You want to see what I do here?” Clint gives the shop a half-hearted wave.

“I had a lot of time to think while I was in protective custody,” Phil says, “And I think that maybe we didn’t get to the best of starts.”

“Oh, the start was really great. There was a sort of middle bit that sucked, though, what with my puking and your lying and the attempts on your life.” Clint props his head up on his arm. His eyes twinkle, which is an awfully trite description, but they do - shiny and dark and happy - and Phil decides he really likes those eyes.

Phil reaches over to take Clint’s free hand in his, pressing a kiss to the long fingers. “Maybe we should start over. Do it right this time.”

“Yeah? Okay.” Clint sits up, a serious expression on his face. “Like, starting now?”

Phil groans as he pushes himself up to an upright position. He sticks out his hand. “Hello. I'm Phil Coulson, temporarily suspended agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. ”

Clint’s grin is wicked as he returns the handshake. “Hi. I am Clint Barton, owner and proprietor of Arachnoflora, occasional contractor for S.H.I.E.L.D., and if we’re done with introductions, and if you can get it up again, I’d really like to suck your cock.”

Alright, Phil thinks. That’s a good start.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, that's done! Yaaaaay! That was fun. It was really nice to write something with pretty much no angst in it at all. I hope you enjoyed it.
> 
> You can find me at [dustjane.tumblr.com](http://dustjane.tumblr.com)!

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [lilacs in late summer](https://archiveofourown.org/works/999264) by [darlingsweet](https://archiveofourown.org/users/darlingsweet/pseuds/darlingsweet)




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